


The Wild Hunt

by sylvanWhispers



Series: Thramsay Halloween [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Abduction, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Animal Death, Dark, Lima Syndrome, M/M, Manipulative Relationship, Obsession, Possessive Behavior, Ramsay is His Own Warning, Stalking, Stockholm Syndrome, Unhealthy Relationships, theon may have a multiple identity problem
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2020-10-05 12:09:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20488667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylvanWhispers/pseuds/sylvanWhispers
Summary: The Driftwood Prince is a wayward god of archers and protector of prey. Every winter the Huntsman, god of chaos and sovereign among predators, tries to steal him away to his realm. Theon never makes it easy.





	1. Chapter 1

The tale of the Hunter’s Moon was one for the deepest and darkest of autumn nights, when the harvests were nearly through and winter loomed warningly on the horizon. Children would gather at the hearth around their grandmothers’ feet and listen in rapt suspense about how the hunting seasons came to be. They would learn of the wayward Driftwood Prince, patron deity of the lost, mentor of archers, protector of prey.

“The Prince is a hunter himself of course,” the elder would say. “He taught man when to reap the deer, the fowl, the hare. How often and how much, so as to not leave the forests barren. He oversees the hunt and punishes those who do not mind the seasons.”

The Lord Huntsman was different. Lord of chaos, greatest of predators and master of beasts. A dark trickster who reveled in cruel sport and bloodshed. He emerged from his realm of shadow and cold, hellhounds gnashing their teeth and devouring all in their path without discrimination.

“It gives him no greater pleasure than to mislead the lost and hunt them for game in his woods,” the elder said. “The Prince caught his eye, so stubborn and proud, but so lovely and lonely and far from home. That day a deep hunger began to brew in the Huntsman’s soul, and the mad god decided that the Prince would be his.”

It was a careful pursuit. Slower than what the Huntsman was used to. With every passing day his desire grew. The Prince did not even know he was being hunted, that he was being watched by increasingly ravenous eyes.

Then began the “gifts” - skinned animals taken outside their due season, dripping bloody and raw where the Prince would find them. Some hollowed, some whole, some split down the middle to expose their glistening organs to the sky. The Prince took it as a challenge, an _insult_, and angrily followed the crimson trail deeper and deeper into the woods.

“It was past nightfall when he heard the horns blowing for him in the distance, the Huntsman and his party galloping from the darkness,” the elder would say to the gaggle of wide-eyed children, details spared depending on their innocence and age. “They chased the Prince down like a common fox and brought him to his knees."

The Huntsman claimed his prey beneath the light of the full moon and upon the flakes of the first snow as hellhounds bayed into the night. He then dragged the Prince down to his realm of shadow and frost, chaining him in his keep as a prize to be broken and humbled and enjoyed at the Huntsman’s pleasure.

“But the seasons always change - in his pride the Huntsman grows complacent and the Prince shall make his escape by spring. He flees to his ocean home, where his queen sister holds him beneath the waves to be healed and reborn anew.”

Until the next autumn, and the next hunt beneath the red moon.

* * *

It always began with something small.

A headless rabbit. A hung bird with broken wings. The heart of a stag.

The bloody tokens were reminders, signals of what was soon to come. Usually they were placed in such a way as to let him know just how close Ramsay had gotten this time: his doorstep, his window, his bedside. Theon had moved his hunting lodge so many times and it never made a difference.

He would have considered an appeal to Stark hospitality, but he and the North King always had some kind of falling out at this time in the cycle, not to reconcile until after Robb awoke from his long winter sleep.Meanwhile Theon’s sister was making her scheduled war with their uncle, which rendered their homeland a maelstrom of crashing waves and ship-breaking storms. No one had the time or means for him, especially not with winter on the way.

Theon grimaced at the butchered muskrat, expertly skinned and cleaned just to be set on his cabin porch.

He’d tried to hand the kills off onto some mortals in the past, to prevent waste whilst also dodging any acceptance of the accursed gifts. It hadn’t ended well - the Huntsman was a jealous creature who could deal insults but never suffer them. Theon’s next present had been made of human bones.

Now he buried the poor animals in the woods. He knew it would be easier on himself if he just accepted the offering, cooked and ate it and ground the bones for the soil. The Huntsman would surely appreciate it, perhaps enough to be a little more gentle when their moon rose.

Theon still spurned the backhanded gifts for the same reason he never surrendered on the night of the hunt. He was always stubborn and proud at the start, always determined that _this_ time would be the time he slipped through Ramsay’s fingers. He wasn’t even sure if the mad god would be pleased or annoyed if Theon gave in. The Huntsman did so love his “sport”.

Once autumn began to draw towards its end the Prince would have to accept it as fact that he was now always being watched: when he walked the woods, when he worked with mortals... when he bathed in the stream. Privacy was a privilege he was no longer afforded.

He tried to act indifferent, defiantly so, when he stripped his clothes at the pond’s edge. Even after all these cycles, pretending that he didn’t know or care about the unseen eyes roving over his bare skin was no easy task.

The snap of a dry twig gave his heart a heavy jolt.

He scanned the area and tried to ease his own budding panic. It couldn’t be Him, not yet - it was part of his _game_ that he only ever taunted and teased before the hunt. It reminded Theon of how Ramsay sometimes fasted his hellhounds to make them even more vicious, and then tempted them with blood to get the hungry beasts in a frenzy. He wondered if that was what Ramsay did to himself in autumn: denying himself whilst working his blood to a boil with the constant surveillance of his prey's flesh.

The source of the disruption was not the Huntsman however. It was a mortal, a young man in trapper’s attire who had stumbled upon the pond. He now stood frozen, unable to stop himself from staring at the god’s nude form. The Driftwood Prince was notoriously beautiful, especially with his fair skin enticingly slick and dripping from his bath.

There had been a time when Theon might have welcomed the attention, but with all things considered he hadn’t taken on a lover in many cycles. Couldn’t risk Ramsay cutting off his cock again.

“M…my lord, I-“

“Get out,” Theon said flatly, turning away in dismissal. “If you make it into town before dark you might escape, but you can never enter the woods again.”

He didn’t bother to curse the mortals that happened upon him naked, as other gods might. He only felt pity in the knowledge that hellhounds would be gnawing their bones by sunrise.

The human came to his senses and fled, graceless footsteps crashing through the foliage and into the distance. Theon sighed and sank deeper into the cold water so that it rippled about his shoulders.

“Jealousy is not very attractive, you know.”

It wasn’t entirely honest. Theon saw appeal in being coveted, in being wanted so exclusively. There were times when he thought to himself that if Ramsay had just tried to seduce him _properly_, things might have gone very different.

Probably not though. Before that first Hunter’s Moon Theon had been a different man. Not a better or worse man, he hoped, but one who would have admittedly laughed at a lord of demons and ghouls aspiring to be the Prince’s lover. Theon didn’t do much laughing these days. Or smiling, for that matter.

He ran his tongue over his teeth. All of them were back in his mouth since his last rebirth, but the memory of having them pulled from his gums remained.

_‘If you won’t smile for me and me alone, you won’t smile at all.’_

He shuddered and told himself it was the autumn chill.

The trapper’s eyes were decorating his windowsill by morning. Theon would try not to think about how the man had most certainly been alive for their removal.

* * *

In the nights leading up to the Hunter’s Moon the prince's movements would become erratic. His cabin would disappear and shift throughout the North, never staying in one area for too long. Anything to confuse the scent. 

His options and mobility were still somewhat limited. Times grew more dangerous as winter drew near and with everyone caught waist-deep in their own conflicts Theon didn’t want to encounter most any of the other gods either. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d either been attacked on sight by another deity or even worse - sold right back to Ramsay in exchange for some favor or other.

Everybody knew of the Huntsman’s great obsession. There were plenty who would exploit it for their own gain and plenty more who would simply turn Theon away, too smart to get involved at all.

There was nowhere to really run to, no safe haven into which he could escape, only choices between different flavors of danger and risk. Theon had long decided that his best course of action was to run and keep running, to do everything in his power to outlast the hunt until the passing of the red moon. He’d come close so many times that he had to believe it was possible.

Moving the cabin took energy that Theon desperately needed to conserve. It was never long before he was finally forced to abandon it entirely - it smelled too much of him and would be the first thing they found - and make for the wild. He used every trick he knew to cover his tracks whilst covering as much ground as possible, with experience telling him that the hunting party would first patrol the nearest coast, his favored place to run. From there they would try to box or herd him deeper into the woods and straight into their lord.

On the fated night, when the sun finally dropped beneath the horizon, it began.

The blast of the Huntsman’s horn was one that Theon had heard many a time in his nightmares. The distinctive call to hunt boomed out for many miles, but the hellhounds could cover remarkable ground in little time. There was no distance great enough to be safe.

Theon ran, feeding off the offerings and tributes given by mortals that were sympathetic to his ordeal that night. Quite by accident he had seemingly become a favored deity to salt wives and thralls - not a position he would have ever asked for, but he couldn’t afford to be picky in desperate times.

He could hear the hooting and hollering of that ghoulish hunting party as the horses and hellhounds trampled through the undergrowth some miles off. He tightened his grip on his bow. The hellhounds’ thick hides were nearly impervious to damage and the one time Theon had shot a beast in the eye, Ramsay had taken one in kind with a hot poker.

_‘I hate that you make me do this. You know how fond I am of your eyes... Lucky for us you’ve got the spare.’_

He didn’t bother shooting at the hounds anymore. The rest of the hunting party however was fair game.

Movement caught Theon’s eye and he froze, eyes adjusting to pick out the silhouette of a deer in the darkness. For a long moment he and the creature merely observed one another. Then, slowly, a thought began to take root in Theon’s brain.

He carefully unclasped his cloak, approaching the animal in easy strides before draping the fur around its shoulders. A moment of silence passed and the doe was off like a bolt into the night, carrying Theon’s scent along with it.

From there he ran, shedding his outer layers as he went. His coat was given to a bear, his gloves to a rabbit and squirrel each, his jerkin carried off by a fox. The prey of the forest mobilized to spread his scent across the woods.

* * *

The calls of the hunting party and snarls of their infernal beasts had long disappeared. Snow was now beginning to fall in fat white flakes upon the earth, and the moon hung full and fading crimson overhead.

Theon had never gotten this far before. The Hunter’s Moon was soon to pass.

He was cold and growing damp from the falling snow, but he was as good as a free man. Theon began to search for a cave or hollow tree to take cover when a scream suddenly tore through his mind.

** _Please_** _, my lord please help us I’m begging you -_

The prayer was nearly incoherent, a garble of desperate pleading and pure agony that Theon could feel like a fist to the gut. No one ever prayed to him like that, he wasn’t that sort of god. People asked the Driftwood Prince for favorable hunts and kind winds in their sails, to find lost paths and safe ways home - not for him to come to their rescue.

Yet here it was, a chorus of screams and begging echoing at full strength in his head. He notched an arrow and followed the prayer’s pull through the trees. With each step the unease in his stomach grew harder and harder to bear, and soon he came to a fire-lit clearing.

The sight before him nearly knocked him to his knees.

The campfire burned hot and bright in the clearing, illuminating the bloodstained grass and soil around it. The animals that had lent Theon their aid were strewn in gory pieces across the earth. Beyond the fire was what appeared to be a woodcutter’s cabin, its front door hanging open in splinters.

“Ah, _there_ he is. Here I worried we’d have to be at this all night.”

The Huntsman stood against the fire like a nightmare, more shadow than man with frost for eyes. He was holding a young maid - presumably the woodcutter’s daughter - by her hair, a long and wicked knife in his other hand. Its silver blade was dripping with blood.

“Thank you, dear. I had all the faith in you.”

The girl cried weakly. Theon didn’t have the strength to ask where her father was as his eyes lingered on the savaged corpses of the animals at his feet. The fox that had carried his jerkin was still twitching.

“I know, I know. You’re very sensitive about these things,” Ramsay said with a sigh. “But I was just _so_ disappointed you see, when I saw that they weren’t you. Cute trick, though. You’ve even half unwrapped yourself for me.”

Theon swallowed, struggling to find his words. He considered taking the shot, arrow still notched and bow at the ready. His aim was true, it always was. It was just rarely worth it, where Ramsay was involved. He'd be lucky to lose less than his hands for the impudence.

He considered shooting the girl, to spare her what worse fate might await her instead. The Huntsman wouldn’t like that either though, stealing his kill. Last time that happened he’d made Theon watch as he flayed a handful of the prince’s own followers.

He swallowed, his grip on his bow wavering.“Ramsay, I-“

“Ramsay, is it? I can see we’re going to have to invest a little more time in retraining you.” Snowflakes had come to rest in the raven curls of the Huntsman’s hair and the flutter of his eyelashes, rendering him beautiful and terrible all at once. “I must say you gave me a good sport. Quite the show this time. I was very entertained.”

The words were delivered with cheer but all sorts of warnings were ringing in Theon’s brain. Fight, flight or fuck - Ramsay found all three of Theon’s panic responses equally amusing, but discerning which he wanted at any given time took intuition. Sometimes he wanted a struggle. Sometimes he wanted a chase. Sometimes he wanted Theon to get on his knees and beg. His tastes fluctuated on a whim and there was only ever one right answer, if even that. At this point it was impossible to tell if Ramsay had enjoyed himself or if he was legitimately furious over falling for the prince's trickery.

“I just can’t have you getting the wrong idea, understand?” Ramsay idly examined the glint of his blade, expression terrifyingly blank and empty. “Can’t have you forgetting what happens when you involve others in our games.”

“I’m sorry.” Theon blurted frantically, hands trembling as the girl continued to shake with sobs. “I didn’t - I thought you liked it when it wasn't easy, I -“

“This is our night, pet. Our _special_ night, and you were going to leave me dry?” Ramsay’s eyes were pure ice. “You must know that if it isn’t you, it’s someone else I have to play with. And no one else takes it quite as well, do they?”

“You’re right. You’re always right, I wasn’t thinking,” Theon said, his mouth painfully dry as he lowered his bow. “It’s our night. Let the girl go and we can… we can have our night, alright? Just you and me, like it’s supposed to be.”

Ramsay fixed him with a look that could only be described as unimpressed. Seconds passed at a glacial, heart-wrenching pace, with the Huntsman’s thoughts unknowable behind his stony mask. Finally he rolled his eyes, releasing the girl with a sharp kick.

“You have ten seconds.”

Both Theon and the girl looked at him in confusion, not certain of to whom he was speaking.

“My lord?”

“I still want my hunt. I’m counting to ten. By the end of it I aim to be bleeding and fucking somebody_, _so _someone_ had better give me a chase.”

The meaning was clear: saving the girl meant doing his damndest to make Ramsay forget she even existed, something only possible by keeping him entertained through what remained of the night.

Theon and the girl bolted in opposite directions: she back to her battered home and he into the dark embrace of the woods. He dropped his bow and shed his quiver and didn’t bother to count the seconds, only focusing on his blind sprint and frantic dodging of trees.

He was fast, but Ramsay had always been stronger, bigger, all around more physically capable. He felt the tackle like a bear had charged him from behind, knocking him several feet forward and into the snow.

The air left Theon’s lungs on impact and his head spun. Ramsay was wrapped around him from behind and hissing things into his ear, words difficult to make out as the world wobbled and tilted.

“-actually thought you could pull one over on me, _me_, when you know damn well that I see everything that goes on in that thick head of yours.” Ramsay’s tongue stroked at the sensitive spot behind Theon’s ear. “_Fuck_ I’ve missed this. You do this to me on purpose, you goddamn tease, trying to get off easy-”

It was happening, Theon thought vacantly. He’d lost again. Another cycle, another potentially years-long winter in the Huntsman’s chains.

Ramsay ripped Theon’s shirt from his body, a task made easier with most of his layers already given away. Rough hands moved reverently over the smooth skin of his back, squeezing and groping him all over like they didn’t know where to touch first.

“I always expect to be more upset, what with you erasing all my work.” Ramsay placed a kiss at the base of Theon’s spine. “But I do love a fresh canvas.”

“I was so close,” Theon whimpered. He hadn’t meant to say the words aloud, but they fell from his lips with a broken sob. “I nearly made it.”

Ramsay paused, hands stopping in their task of unbuckling his belt.

“… You stupid creature,” he said, voice deeply fond. “Don’t you get it by now? All prey have their season and this here is yours. Winter will come, game will grow scarce without you and men will die in the cold. It is as it should be.”

“That’s not-“ Theon was choking on his own tears. “That isn't-“

“Balance goes both ways, pet. We’re bound together, you and I.” Ramsay pressed his face into the prince’s neck, breathing him in. “You’ve had your fun. Now it’s my turn.”

It always hurts the first time, when the Driftwood Prince is claimed beneath the Hunter’s Moon upon the cruel forest floor. His screams echo across the North, carried by the winds, and animals flee into the night knowing that the dark days of the Huntsman are now upon them.

Children bundled at the family hearth might cry out in dismay at this, asking their grandmothers and their nans what the purpose of such a terrible story could be. Where is the lesson, the justice, the moral?

“The moral is that to all things there is a season,” the elder will say soberly. “That no one, not even the gods, can break the turning wheels of time, fate and fortune.”

The children will sulk and shiver, recite to each other the warning to never stray into the woods if they hear the Huntsman’s horn blowing. They'll climb into their warm beds, prayers on their lips and fear in their hearts for the long nights ahead.

And somewhere far away in a cold and shrouded fortress the Prince will lie shackled at his lord’s feet, his wounded heart full of desperate hopes that this winter will be a short one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just getting into that Halloween mood a month early, as I do. Might do more for this au as we finally get into autumn.


	2. Chapter 2

The Driftwood Prince had once been a god of pleasure.

An incorrigible hedonist, a wayfarer with no true home or planted roots to speak of. He’d been sex and liquor and romps in the woods, pure indulgence and laughter without concern nor fear for the future. That was a long time past now, so long ago that aspect of himself had since been relegated to backstory in the mortals’ eyes. A footnote to elaborate on how far he’d fallen.

Now the Prince was prey and displacement, suffering and rebirth. His life still maintained a certain rhythm: Springtime with his sister, summer with the North King,autumn guiding humans in the woods.

But his winters belonged to the Huntsman.

The Prince would languish every winter in the Huntsman’s keep, broken and bleeding and longing for spring. A lost and lonely victim of the mad god’s lust. There was no tale exploited more by poets when it came to depicting the madness of desire, the mania of infatuation.

“Love, hate and hunger are coiled tighter than one might think,” the bards would sing. “And there is none so hungry as the Huntsman, in his want for the Driftwood Prince.”

"So who keeps whom, one dare may ask, in cruel or stronger chains? Before winter thaws may oceans rise, and predator be snared by prey."

* * *

Theon often dreamt of the sea.

The cold grip of the water, the bitter taste of brine as it flooded his lungs, the pound of the waves crashing in time with his heart. He could feel his sister’s unyielding hold on him as the tide washed his pain away, beat by beat. The ocean purged him of his aches and scars, rebuilt what had been taken, flushed his mind as best it could. All of that suffering was another life, another Theon.

He had been unmade and remade so many times now.

Sometimes he wished the ocean could keep him for good. How he yearned to finally find a safe place to lay his head down and _rest_, even if it was at the bottom of the deep. His obligations to the forest, the humans and his second family always drove him inland, wandering from one pain or loss to the next.

The dream faded and Theon was pulled from the waves by featherlight fingers running along the lines of his clavicle, gentle breaths warming his ear. He slowly came back into his weathered body, sore and bruised, swallowed in a tangle of furs and silk sheets. Despite the luxury there was no comfort. His arms were strained and stiff on account of the leather cuffs binding his wrists the headboard.

“Good morning.” Those wandering fingers began to trace idle shapes across his chest. “Finally exhausted that awful attitude, hm?”

Theon wanted to bury his face in the cushions. For the first few weeks after his capture he would always hiss and spit like a feral cat against his restraints, his mind and body revolting at the notion of being trapped for another long winter. Ramsay found it amusing. Adorable even. Beating and fucking his conquest into submission was one of his favorite past times, but eventually Theon did need to settle down or risk losing something important so soon.

He tenderly felt at the stub that had been made of his right pinky. He could have made out worse - he _had _made out worse in the past - by this point.

Ramsay rolled over to blanket him with the solid heat of his weight, a sigh escaping his chest as their naked bodies aligned. Theon always expected the Huntsman to be cold, frozen like the ice in his eyes, but the man was a living furnace.

“It’s a new day,” he said, pressing a kiss to his mouth. Theon valiantly did not bite him, determined to keep his teeth for as long as possible. “Can’t spend it wasting away in bed, can we?”

He pulled away, taking his warmth with him, and it was a struggle not to chase it. It was far too soon in the season for Theon to be cracking already, but sometimes it was just so _hard_ not to cling to the scraps of affection he was given.

“I thought I’d let you stretch your legs today, now that you’ve settled,” Ramsay was saying as he pulled on a shirt. “We _are_ out of that phase now, yes? Not that I’m rushing you; you know I enjoy you in all your forms.”

Theon stared unseeing at one of the portraits adorning the wall, heavy-framed and depicting a needlessly gory hunt. Ramsay was always insufferably smug and pleased with himself in the early winter, still riding the high of his victory.

“I would very much like to accompany you, my lord.” His voice sounded flat and defeated even to his own ears.

“Oh? Are you sure?” Ramsay’s amusement was palpable as he leaned over Theon’s form. “Perhaps you’re too tired. I understand if I’ve worn you out.”

Theon swallowed, eyes briefly falling closed. When he’d sufficiently braced himself he met the Huntsman’s expectant gaze.

“I don’t want to be left alone. I’ll be good if you let me up, I promise.”

Something flashed in those winter eyes.

“Well,” he said, voice low and rough. “How could I refuse that?”

Theon groaned as his wrists were freed and dull pain pulsed through his arms. By the time he’d pulled himself upright, the feeling in his limbs ringing unpleasantly, Ramsay had already done up his trousers.

He cleared his throat with a motion at his open shirt and Theon pushed off the bed, stumbling forward on weak legs. With his nine fingers he threaded the laces into place, keenly aware of the sharp eyes examining him. When his work was just about done he felt the press of Ramsay’s forehead rub against his temple.

Theon bit into his bottom lip. Why did he have to do this? Mixing the torment with such awful tenderness and looking at Theon as if he were actually something of value in this blighted place. It wrought havoc on his mind and the bastard must have known.

His breath caught at the sensation of broad hands skimming along his naked body, badly bruised in some places but as of yet only mildly scarred. He felt a smile curl against his skin as lips pressed to his ear.

“Isn’t it so nice to be home?”

* * *

Theon had come to know a wretched familiarity with the Huntsman’s realm of snow, darkness, and endless woods. The Dreadfort was an infernal place with halls haunted by living shadows and ghouls and dismal memories. Pain, suffering and loss were etched into its stone walls and its foundations were steeped in generations’ worth of blood and tears. Doors opened and closed on their own and screams echoed from nowhere.

Ramsay liked to show him off: the Driftwood Prince, reduced to little more than a chained and collared pet. Most places he went, Theon was to follow three paces behind. Whenever he took a seat Theon was on the floor at his boots. The food he received was often eaten from the lord’s own fingers. Insult and injury always went hand in hand in the Dreadfort.

Theon grit his teeth and bore every indignity. He knew all too well that it could always get worse. It _would_ get worse just for the Huntsman’s pleasure, but there was no sense in hurrying the process along.

He learned very early on that he was yet another one of the Huntsman’s trophies, as much a prize as the bearskin rug in his chambers or the wolf heads mounted in the great hall. It did strange things to his stomach, being made to sit at the base of the Huntsman’s throne as he cast judgement on doomed mortals, a gloved hand absently petting through his hair.

“Such a harsh winter we’re having, isn’t it?” Ramsay asked, toying with Theon’s dark locks as yet another incoherent soul was dragged to the dungeons. “We usually don’t get so many so soon.”

The worse the weather got outside, the more desperate humans became. Criminals were the first to be sacrificed, bound to altars in the woods for the ghouls to drag away to their realm. The offerings were intended to appease the Huntsman and send favorable hunts their way, while at the same time eliminating extra mouths to feed. Once Ramsay had his fun with his victims’ flesh, their spirits would wander the cursed forest of his realm forever.

The thought made Theon vaguely ill, in no small part because Ramsay always liked to make him watch.

“You don’t look very excited. What’s wrong?” The grip on his hair tightened, tugging his head back to meet his arctic gaze. “Perhaps you’d like to keep them company. It’s been a while since I left you in the dungeons. Maybe you’d prefer it, hm?”

Theon took a steadying breath through his nose, mind quickly rifling for the safest answer. The Huntsman was terribly reliable when it came to giving him the opposite of what he wanted or asked for.

“I’m grateful for anything you give me, my lord.”

Ramsay’s eyes briefly narrowed.

“You’re a sly little cunt, you know that?” He released Theon with a snort, ruffling his hair roughly. “It’s disgraceful really, the things I let you get away with.”

Theon stamped down on his scorn while yet another damned soul was brought forward for appraisal. Things could, after all, always be worse.

* * *

The Huntsman could never seem to decide on whether he coveted or hated the Driftwood Prince. One day he would have his pet in bed, laving kisses across shaking thighs, and the next he would be reveling in pain and degradation down in the dungeon. He just couldn’t settle on whether Theon was his lover, his dog or his prisoner, and fluctuated between them without reason.

There didn’t need to be a justification for his torment after all - if it wasn’t punishment, it was play. Knives were the Huntsman’s favorite toys by far and flaying was his favorite game; he carved into flesh like an artist sculpting wood, slicing and peeling skin away in strips, shapes and designs.

It really was a bizarrely intimate thing, torture. Or maybe that was just the way Ramsay did it. He liked to get close, liked to touch. Liked to _talk_, prying into his victim’s mind as easily as he did for flesh. Theon took it better than most but still needed to be strapped down. Even after all this time there was no fully desensitizing oneself to the Huntman’s blade.

Theon gnawed on the leather gag that kept him from biting through his tongue and watched Ramsay ‘work’, his wet sea green eyes both hateful and pleading.

“I’d do this forever just to keep you looking at me like that.” Ramsay sighed happily, his finger idly drawing a crimson swirl on Theon’s thigh. “You’ve turned me into such a romantic, you conniving little snake.”

Theon felt something deep his chest twist with rage. He never asked for any of this. He’d only ever tried to prevent it, for fuck’s sake.

“This is your fault, you know.” Ramsay swiped the blood from his knife. “You did this to me. So now I get to do _this_ to _you_.”

Theon was glad for the gag because in that moment it kept him from spitting on the bastard and losing more than he already was. It was hardly his fault that the Huntsman was insane, ‘infected’ with the sick obsession that now plagued his black heart. Theon didn’t even know when this all started. How long had he been stalked for prior to that first hunt beneath the red moon? What had Ramsay seen him do or say, to start all of this madness? It couldn’t have been about looks alone.

The Huntsman both did and did not care about the Prince’s beauty. He enjoyed his pet’s body of course, but perfection was just so… plain, in his eyes. Apparently the source of his obsession was what lay just beneath the immaculate exterior.

_“You’re a dirty little faker,”_ he had once hissed into Theon’s ear, knife in hand as he circled the saltire. “You smile and jape and spread your legs, but inside? You’re a bleeding _wreck.”_

Ramsay wanted to peel back that flawless skin to expose the brokenness underneath, wanted to make the outside match the filthy, shattered insides. He wanted to rip away the royal pride and finery and hold a mirror up to the mess underneath, just to show the little lordling what he truly was deep down. The Prince’s story was a tragedy long before the Huntsman came along. He just cut away the façade.

He stroked Theon’s face with a faraway gaze, thumb tracing the cracked lips.

“You’re ruined and it’s _beautiful_, more beautiful than the mask you wore ever was.”

For a brief and terrible moment Theon had felt something almost like gratitude. Someone had seen him laid so unflatteringly bare and still wanted the needy, scared thing he kept locked inside more than the illusion.

The feeling only lasted for as long as it took for Ramsay’s knife to start moving again.

* * *

They had reached the midpoint in Theon’s captivity wherein he was no longer actively struggling, but neither was he broken and meek. It was a grudging kind of compliance, with open defiance traded for the freedom to navigate the innermost fortress with supervision. The length of chain that linked his ankles and hobbled his steps announced him anyway, broadcasting his comings and goings as iron clattered and dragged upon stone.

After all these cycles Theon knew the rhythm of the household and the places he was expected to occupy. It amused Ramsay to have his prince attending to him in a parody of domesticity and Theon swallowed his disdain, knowing he’d go mad all the sooner if left idle. Though he understood little of the shades’ chittering language the servants at least seemed more pitying than malicious.

Some evenings he was tasked with bringing up his lord’s meals, which was always a mild sort of struggle. He could only move so quickly with his legs restrained, but going too slow would leave the food cold on arrival. He shuffled at a carefully hurried pace through the keep, hoping earnestly that none of the ghouls felt inspired to block or trip him.

The hunting party seemed to think he was the most ‘fun’ at this stage of things - still proud enough to be indignant at his humiliation, but well-beaten enough to know he was powerless to do anything about it. They were prone to harass and impede him in his tasks, to taunt him with the liberties they’d seen or heard their lord take with his body. It all became white noise for the most part, this daily dose of shame and inconvenience.

As he approached the Huntsman’s personal chamber he frowned at the sight of the large, ornately carved door being ajar - until a moment later, when he became aware of the sounds coming from within. He should have promptly set the tray at the threshold and made for the opposite direction, but for some accursed reason he couldn’t stop himself, drawn in by his own horror and vile curiosity.

The door fell open with the slightest touch, slowly swinging inward to unveil the carnality taking place.

Theon had the Huntsman’s chamber memorized in a painfully intimate way. He’d been fucked in that bed, on the floor, over the desk. Now he watched while Ramsay was fucked into the black sheets, panting as the slender woman astride him rode his cock and moaned.

They moved to a brutal rhythm, rough and animalistic. Ramsay had his hands on the woman’s thigh, her breast; his head tilted back against the furs to expose the curve of his throat. Unfairly beautiful for someone so rotten inside. He still had his boots on, which along with the open door indicated that Myranda had simply strode in and mounted him on the spot.

Of course Theon knew about Myranda. She was one of the more prominent hellions of the hunting party, certainly the most prominent woman. Apparently she and Ramsay had grown up together, back when she was still human and he was still a demigod.

It was a miracle Theon didn’t drop the tray when stormy eyes met his own, a low groan finally escaping the Huntsman’s lips.

A strange and distant numbness overtook Theon’s body as he placed the tray on the nearby desk with stiff, automatic movements. He wordlessly turned heel and left the scene, shutting the door properly behind him.

* * *

Theon was allowed in the courtyard, what with its high walls completely boxing in the paltry stretch of lawn. The grass was frosted over to the point of resembling shards of glass and the small pond was entirely frozen solid, but he sat on a frigid bench and stared into it anyway.

It wasn’t as if he’d had any delusions of celibacy on Ramsay’s part. Obviously the god took lovers. A fair portion of his devotees included restless young women who hungered for the mad freedom of his woods, with the ones who passed his tests given new lives in his realm. The ones who failed were meat for the hellhounds.

Theon boggled at how anyone would consider the so-called reward worth the risk, but apparently there was a surplus of women eager to court such danger. It surely wouldn’t have been so if Ramsay’s _own _exterior were made to match his interior, the hypocrite.

It wasn’t jealousy, he told himself. It was just disorienting to see the evidence in person. Ramsay had no shortage of eager bedmates, so why did he bother so persistently with Theon? Why could he not sate himself on one of the many _willing_ partners he had waiting in the wings?

He didn’t look up at the approaching footsteps, only grimaced at the sound of someone tromping carelessly over the crystalline grass.

“Enjoy the show?”

He spared Myranda the barest glance. She was objectively attractive, even withall of the color having been leeched out of her along with her humanity. He shrugged.

“I’ve seen better.”

She scowled. “I don’t know why he brings you back here. I keep waiting for him to get bored of breaking you already.”

_You and me both, bitch._ Theon counted the cracks in the pond and wondered if she’d report him to Ramsay for rudeness if he got up and left.

“One of these days he has to get sick of you. You’re just his chew toy,” Myranda said with disgust. “He’s always loved to hurt pretty, spoiled little cunts like you. You’re nothing special, you just give him a good laugh.”

Theon said nothing because there was nothing to say. None of her words were in of themselves false.

“I was at Ramsay’s side back when he had nothing. When he was no one.” Myranda’s gaze flicked over him dismissively. “You don’t know him like I do.”

Theon frowned. It was true that he only knew the mortals’ version of Ramsay’s story, the various tasks and trials he’d had to endure in order to prove himself to his father and ascend to full godhood. The Dread Lord was not an easy titan to please, so apparently the process had taken years. Myranda really had known him a long time.

Content in having the last word she swept from the courtyard, her departure barely even disturbing the air. Theon stayed on the bench, knuckles going white from the cold and the strength of his grip on the armrest.

After that first moon and first long season of ice and dread, Theon had tried to be as he’d once been. A god of pleasure and indulgence, as if the horrors of winter had never happened. It was piece by agonizing piece that his new situation sank in.

Liquor now made the locked doors of his mind come loose, made him feel slow and vulnerable and too honest with his words and emotions. And sex? That was out of the question. His attempts were shadowed by an unseen presence looming over his shoulder and behind his eyelids, even if he was an ocean away from the Huntsman and beyond his reach. The paranoia remained. _What if. What if he finds out what I did?_

And Ramsay did find out, eventually. Because Theon had been stupid and fucked a girl in the North - did it to prove something to himself even though his hands were shaking, did it to soothe Robb’s concerns even though every second of the act had made him feel like he was dying inside. He’d just wanted things to be as they were before.

The incident had taught him once and for all that even if his flesh was mended, there was simply no bringing back the old Theon. When Ramsay later held him down, a knife poised over the prince’s naked groin as apologies ran like water from a drowned man’s mouth, Theon had actually meant his words. He was sorry he’d ever tried.

He had to face facts. The Huntsman had hollowed him out, gutted him like a felled stag and stolen his insides all away, and now Theon had nothing to give to anyone else. Ramsay could get away laying claim to all of his person and only giving shards or scraps in return, and it wasn’t fucking fair.

Theon had always taken a cold comfort in knowing that at least Ramsay had seen him down to the bone with all his weaknesses laid bare and _wanted_ him. Wanted him to a deranged extent granted, but wanted him all the same. Yet apparently it wasn’t enough.

Even to the Huntsman, the Driftwood Prince was just not enough.

Story of Theon’s life.

* * *

Ramsay didn’t bring up the incident, perhaps because in his mind it wasn’t an incident at all. His trophy had walked in on him fucking one of his lovers, so what? It was only a surprise that it hadn’t happened sooner.

“You knew a lot of women didn’t you?” He was lazily sprawled on his bed, watching as Theon set out his next day’s clothes. “What was the last one’s name again?”

“… I don’t remember, my lord,” Theon said, as if he hadn’t shared a kennel with a hound named Kyra every winter since.

“Mm, I suppose not. It _has_ been a long time after all,” Ramsay said, looking pleased. “Pity. The old you might have understood.”

“Understood?”

He rolled his eyes with a dramatic sigh. “Myranda’s been pestering me about marriage again. Gets in that _mood_ every now and then, you see. Aren’t women tiresome? If you can recall, of course.”

“I’m not sure I do.” Theon cleared his throat and looked meaningfully to the door. “If that’s all-“

“So what do you think then?” Ramsay asked, fingers slowly drumming on his thigh. “Should I marry the wench?”

“It’s… not my place to say, my lord.”

“It is your place to answer when I ask you a question.” His tone allowed for no argument, brow raised expectantly.

Theon felt something in him shrivel with dread. He had absolutely no idea what the right answer to this might be. He wasn’t so foolish as to think that marriage would keep Ramsay from hunting and toying with him every winter, but it would certainly make his ‘wife’ feel more entitled in her anger about it.

Theon steeled himself. “I think she’s beneath you.”

Ramsay clicked his tongue and turned his gaze to the ceiling, mulling the answer over.

“You aren’t wrong of course. It’s what my father might say, at least.” Their eyes met again with a chilling glint. “I suppose _you _think you’d be worthy of me, then?”

Theon went rigid. “I. No! Of course not. I’m nothing. I would never presume -“

“Oh hush, you’re not nearly far along enough to be singing that tune just yet,” Ramsay said. “And you’re a _prince_ after all, aren’t you?”

“I’m no prince here.”

“You’re what I make you to be.” Ramsay tilted his head, regarding Theon with half-lidded eyes. “So what would it be then? My bride, or my dog?”

“That- I-“ There was no hiding his panic, especially not to a man who had always read him so thoroughly. “My lord-“

“What’s wrong? Aren’t you _honoured_ to be given the choice?” Ramsay’s tone took a more dangerous turn as he sat upright. “Or maybe you still think you’re too good for me. Is that it? Is the Driftwood Prince _too good_ to marry a former half-breed?”

“That is hardly the problem!” Theon snapped.

Ramsay was right, it was too early in the winter for him to be broken down and crawling already. Especially since it was clear from the current state of things that he’d be getting the blade tomorrow either way.

“Oh, so it’s because I’m too rough with you? Please.” Ramsay scoffed. “Listen to you whine and whimper like the dog you are. As if anything I do to you actually sticks.”

“You think it doesn’t stick?” Theon asked incredulously. “You think there’s any ocean in the world that can wash away what you’ve done to me?”

There was a moment of silence and the prince could feel his filthy, dirty pride coming alive in his chest again, that traitorous part of himself that only ever brought more pain and suffering onto his person.

‘_You don’t know him like I do._’ Fucking unbelievable.

“Have you ever cut her?”

Ramsay blinked. “What?”

“Myranda.” Theon’s fists were clenching at his sides. “Do you ever make her bleed?”

Seconds ticked by at an agonizing pace. Ramsay seemed genuinely bewildered, looking at Theon as if wondering after his sanity.

“It’s a simple question,” Theon said, stony and controlled. “I’m asking if you’ve ever made her _scream_. If she knows what it’s like to be on your rack, if she’s seen the way your eyes light up or go cold when you’re taking her skin. Has she experienced that? Experienced _you_?”

Theon never approached Ramsay without order or invitation, which made it all the more unsettling when he suddenly invaded his captor’s space, fingers tangling with the front of his nightshirt.

“Has she ever called you master and meant it? Begged at your feet for reasons other than getting your cock hard? _Well_?” Theon’s voice was low but his eyes were casting venom. “I’m asking you, _my lord_, if she knows you _like_ _I do_.”

Ramsay’s pupils were blown wide, something almost like alarm hidden in those frigid depths. Theon snorted and stepped back, sharply straightening the other man’s shirt.

“I didn’t think so.”

He left without being dismissed, door swinging shut behind him with a heavy slam. By the time he arrived at the kennels he’d already calculated which toes and fingers he was most prepared to lose.

* * *

Eventually Ramsay always outgrew his early-winter clinginess, with his awful need to have his prize at his heel or in his chamber at all times finally abating. Theon would thus be sent to the kennels, like a toy being put in a box for later play. Despite the indignity and bitter cold of bedding with hellbeasts, being Ramsay’s dog was an upgrade from being his prisoner in the dungeons. Theon told himself anything was preferable to nights strapped to a saltire or curled at the far end of his lord’s mattress like a bedslave.

He and the hellhounds had come to form a somewhat unorthodox relationship. The hulking beasts were pushy and competitive and didn’t like to share their food, but they had grown used to his presence. They snarled and snapped their jaws in their sleep, but allowed him to pile with them for warmth at night. They liked him, inexplicably and ironically enough, more than the Stark direwolves probably ever had.

This was the first time Theon had ever dismissed _himself_ to the kennels, but no one had stopped him. He curled into an empty stall and waited through a sleepless night for when Ramsay would surely descend with knife in hand to flay and amputate the prince's parts.

Morning came. He kept waiting.

Was it a test? Another cruel jape perhaps, to keep him in suspense? Ramsay never passed on the opportunity to discipline him. Was he supposed to keep waiting and neglect his chores in the process, racking up interest on his inevitable punishment? Knowing the Huntsman there was no winning either way.

Eventually Theon could take it no more and left the kennels, taking to the service hallways and stairwells to prolong the inevitable. He would dodge into some alcove or other whenever he heard the distinctive rhythm of heavy boots, knowing his lord’s gait anywhere. It was a valiant, albeit doomed effort.

When their paths finally crossed he found himself freezing like a startled deer. The Huntsman looked at him, with those unknowably empty eyes, as Theon waited for any kind of response. A cutting word, an order for him to be taken to the dungeons. Yet Ramsay only stared at him and continued to do so even as Theon awkwardly resumed his tasks.

It continued for a while, this strange silence between them. Theon went about his duties and Ramsay only _watched_, sharp and assessing and stoic. He looked at Theon as if he’d never quite seen him before, a slight pinch to his brow like he was solving a puzzle. Others had begun to take notice of the tension but most knew better than to question their lord’s behavior.

“You’ve been following your mutt around for days,” Myranda’s voice carried just far enough for Theon to stop himself from entering the great hall. He shuffled awkwardly from the entryway, cringing at every scrape of his chains on the stone floor. “Just take him to the dungeons already if he’s displeased you.”

“Don’t presume to tell me what to do with what’s _mine_, Myranda.” Ramsay sounded bored, a deliberate affect he sometimes used to warn someone off a subject.

Myranda probably recognized it too, but apparently considered herself immune. “Yours? He’ll be gone by spring and you know it. Keeping that creature is like holding smoke; he never stays and never will.”

“You’d best watch your tongue.” Theon could practically feel the frost in Ramsay’s gaze through the walls. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know how property works. Last I checked, a seasonal lease is not ownership.”

There was a deafening clatter and Theon cringed, the image of spilled wine and broken glass flashing through his mind. A sharp crack of flesh on flesh echoed from the hall.

“_Shut your whore mouth,_” Ramsay hissed. “He’s mine. I won him, I chained him. He belongs to _me_.”

Theon ducked into a cleaning closet just in time to evade the angry stride of his lord abandoning the great hall. Myranda had a knack for painful truths at least. If the Huntsman’s conquest at the end of every autumn was inevitable, then there was an equally fixed outcome that arrived every spring:

The Prince _always_ escaped.

No matter what measures Ramsay took, no matter how confident he might become that _this _time his pet was too broken to consider leaving, he was always wrong. There came a point when chains, guards and dogs simply weren’t enough, and by some unseen miracle the prince would slip like water through his captor’s fingers.

One way or another, come spring Theon was going home.

Wherever that was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Friday 13th ya'll


	3. Chapter 3

Theon wasn’t prepared for how quickly things escalated.

Ever since his outburst in the great hall the Huntsman had grown progressively unstable, lashing out at servants and spending inordinate amounts of time in the dungeon. The Prince didn’t expect to be left to his self-imposed exile to the kennels and sure enough it wasn’t long before his lord came to retrieve him.

When Ramsay entered the hellhounds went quiet, eyes turned to their master with rapt interest and expectation. The torch in his hand dazzled Theon’s eyes after so long in the dark.

“There you are,” he said, as if his captive was likely to be anywhere else. “I’ve been thinking about you all night. All week, really. Isn’t that sweet?”

Theon sat curled in his kennel, arms folded around his knees. He didn’t look at the other man, not even when the Huntsman eased himself to sit on the floor outside his stall.

“So,” Ramsay said, hand clapping his knee, “it comes to my attention that you’re feeling a little unappreciated, hm?”

Theon said nothing and continued to stare stubbornly at the wall.

“I understand. My boy feels neglected.” Ramsay continued in faux-sympathy. “It seems all my bitches are clamoring for my attention these days.”

Theon did not roll his eyes, but the energy of the gesture came across regardless. He was just so tired.

“Why am I here?” His voice sounded as weary and dull as he felt inside. “You could flay and fuck anybody. Do you hate me that much, to go through all this, every cycle, for a jape?”

A pause.

“… Get out of the kennel, Theon.” The man had gone blank again and Theon knew better than to refuse.

The pack watched with bare interest as Ramsay coaxed him out of his stall, chains rattling in the process. They knew that Theon was not a good dog, often shackled by his collar like a disobedient mutt and frequently beaten or mounted by their master on the floor.

“That’s it. Come here, puppy.” Ramsay purred, pulling him into his arms.

Theon let himself be positioned and settled in his lap. Held snugly to that broad chest he could feel the rise and fall of even breathing, as well as the steady beat of a cold heart against his back.

Ramsay sighed contentedly. “You’re a wicked, prideful little thing, aren’t you?”

“Yes my lord.”

“I should whip you to ribbons in front of the whole fort.”

“… Yes, my lord.”

Ramsay tsked, hands absently running along the lines of Theon’s body.

“You know what I thought when I first saw you? I thought, _that’s mine_.” He squeezed just tight enough to make Theon wince. “I watched you and I knew. You were made for me. Two sides of a coin, we are.”

He rested his chin in the crook of Theon’s neck, the feather-light brush of eyelashes dancing against the prince’s skin.

“It was summer, actually. You were such a fucking cunt then. Arrogant, obnoxious, entitled. Everything I hate about… well, boys like you. Beached sea trash that thought he could walk into the woods like he owned it. As if a bow and a title gave you the right.” Ramsay chuckled darkly. “I couldn’t wait to show you how wrong you were. How little the trees and the shadows between them care if their meat’s wearing a crown or not.”

Theon tensed. “So what happened?”

“I watched you, waiting for the right time. And oh, the _things _I saw.” Ramsay grinned against his neck. “You’re not a hard read. Don’t know why everyone else was having such trouble. I suppose some things are easy to overlook when you don’t care.”

Theon said nothing even as he felt something crack inside of him.

“No one saw how desperate you were, how eager to please. How you just wanted a place to lay your loyalty and belong. It was pathetic, really.” Ramsay’s tone turned contemplative. “Pain does all sorts of things to people. Gives them all sorts of different… flavours, I suppose. I found myself liking yours. Reminded me of a kicked dog. I let you live a while, just to see what you’d do next.”

A laugh rumbled through his chest.

“And then you and Stark had that _stupid _fight. He actually had the audacity to be surprised when you chose your blood kin. Idiot. If he ever expected you to think of yourself as _his,_ he’d been going about it all wrong.”

Theon swallowed thickly. “I made a mistake.”

Conflict had sparked between the humans, the gods had taken sides and Theon chose _wrong_. No matter how long ago it had been, the regret and guilt and shame of it never faded. Robb’s eventual forgiveness had only made it worse, actually.

“When your family turned you out I thought it was finally time - without anyone’s protection you were easy pickings. But it was cute, in a weird sort of way, watching you try to bring order to the forest. Endearing.” Ramsay paused. “It snuck up on me, you know. These feelings. This hunger. It was a slow build. Then autumn began to grow cold and… I was already having these _thoughts._”

Theon hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath until he was forced to take a ragged gulp of breath, his frail heart rattling in his chest.

“You wouldn’t have understood back then. You didn’t even know who you were. I had to _show_ you. Had to wring that awful haughtiness out of you so you could realize.” Thick arms wrapped around Theon’s waist. “And you do realize now, don’t you? You and I are inevitable. You’ve spent all your life looking for where to belong and it’s always been at my feet.”

Something inside of Theon twisted painfully. It wasn’t okay for Ramsay to do that, to make use of all of the insecurities and vulnerabilities he’d pried out of Theon’s head over the years. Ramsay been inside of his most private and intimate places, physical and mental, and only ever used what he found there to cut and burn where it would hurt most.

“I’m… very grateful, my lord.”

Ramsay made an irritated noise. “I find your cheek entertaining at times but right now it’s testing my patience. Don’t be impudent.”

They sat like that for a moment, Ramsay petting him with gentle, deliberate motions. Theon tried very hard not to find it comforting.

“I noticed that you never answered my question. About whether you’d be my bride or my hound.”

In an instant Theon’s veins turned to ice. Even the frigid air of the kennels had suddenly become stifling and heated.

“We could do it,” Ramsay said lowly. “It’s just a contract in the end. Just comes down to vows, really. You could make an oath to me-“

Theon nearly swallowed his own tongue. He would have leapt to his feet but the Huntsman held fast, thick muscle taut against his back.

“Could make an _oath_, I said, that you’ll be mine and won’t leave me again.” Ramsay’s grip was crushing, suffocating. “I’ll have you swear it. You’ll be mine in every way, for _always_.”

Theon had begun to breath erratically, the room tilting and shaking around him.

Such vows could negotiate him certain entitlements like food and security, but it would also make him the Huntsman’s property in an official and lawful manner. As a prisoner Theon might be completely at the mad god’s mercy, but they both knew his escape was inevitable. Ramsay could own Theon’s body and even break his mind, but there were still parts of the prince that could only be given.

He rode out his panic, head dizzy with it and throat sore from his rasping breaths.

“No.”

“… No?” Ramsay repeated icily into Theon’s ear.

The prince shuddered. “I can’t. I- you know that I can’t!”

“You can’t, can you? Why not? Is there someone else you’re saving yourself for?” Ramsay snarled, his fingers digging cruel tracks into Theon’s arms. “I killed the last bitch you fucked. Have you been screwing around behind my back, somewhere I can’t see? I know you used to be a whore. Who is it? The fucking North King?”

“Ramsay-“

“Don’t you say my name, don’t you _fucking_ dare!” Ramsay was lost in his rage, rabid with it. “Does he open you up first? Touch you gentle, call you sweet names, treat you like a prince? What a fucking joke.”

He stood suddenly, dumping Theon in a heap on the floor.

“He wouldn’t want you like I do. Without your pretty face _no one_ would. When are you going to get that through your head? The only one who deserves you is _me_. I’m the only one who sees what a filthy wretch you are and still- and still-” He wasn’t able to finish, words dissolving into a frustrated growl.

“Ra- my lord,” Theon was scrabbling desperately for what to say, what could save him. “Please, I-“

“You know better than to think that word is going to help you,” Ramsay snapped coldly.

He was pacing now like a caged animal, edgy and feral. The hellhounds were beginning to shift with their master’s unrest.

“So tell me, _prince_, what you do with him in the summertime. Do you smile and laugh and pretend winter didn’t happen, after you’ve washed me off like a dirty secret? Does he fucking _buy it_ when you’re faking?” He gripped Theon’s jaw and twisted him to face his icy gaze. “Does he see through your lies, how shattered you are? _Does he know you like I do?”_

Theon’s face was wet with tears and once he realized he was crying he couldn’t stop. Robb had never had to see him broken before. He slept through winter and by the time they reunited in summer, Theon was already mended by his sister. Of course Robb knew the stories, everyone did, but it was… easy, almost, to laugh the worst of it off as rumor. Especially since Robb wanted so badly to believe him.

“Well _fine_. Come on then.” Ramsay dragged Theon to his feet by his collar. “It seems I’ll be needing that whip after all.”

* * *

Theon was bound to a post in the courtyard, knees digging into the frozen sand as he was stripped pink against the cold.

Each strike of the whip was a lash of pure fire on his chilled skin, his blood dripping down his back like hot wax. He didn’t count the strokes, didn’t look up to see the audience spectating his punishment. His mind was a flurry of white noise, the roar of the sea pounding through his ears with each pulse of his heart. His back was an unending throb of pain, a gory hash of welts and lacerations that he tried to push from his mind. He’d had worse.

Eventually when his flesh was surely a scarlet mess, there came a lull in the strikes.

Half-delirious, Theon startled at the feeling of someone brushing his sweat-soaked bangs from his face. Ramsay pressed their foreheads together, the air thick with blood and sweat, and his body shook with a heavy sigh.

“I’d be good to you,” he murmured. “I would be so good. I could make you happy.”

Theon didn’t believe him. Even at his most broken, the worst he’d ever been - castrated, half-flayed, more fingers missing than not, licking the Huntsman’s boots unprompted - Theon wouldn’t have believed a promise like that.

“Just say yes, sweetling,” Ramsay urged gently. “Just say you’ll be mine and all of this will go away.”

_If I say yes it will _never_ go away, _Theon thought venomously.

The silence lasted a beat too long and Ramsay pulled away, face blank.

“You’ll come around.”

Angry footsteps stomped away. The lashes resumed.

It was an effort not to succumb to misery. The Huntsman had finally gone too far and asked for the impossible, and in his quest for it he would push Theon until the prince was nothing but dust.

* * *

Theon took his punishments. He weathered the pain. He didn’t have a choice. Two more fingers were gone: his left index and right middle. The nail of his remaining pinky had been wrenched out, but the finger itself blessedly let be for the moment.

Ramsay’s appetites had been renewed with a sort of fevered madness; every night he took his pleasure from Theon’s body in one way or another, insatiable with the blade as well as in bed. Only now there was no satisfaction, no sated look on his features when they were done - instead those winter eyes were constantly burning hot with something Theon couldn’t decode. It felt like Ramsay was searching for something, some kind of assurance or vindication that could ease his fears and heal his pride. He looked at Theon like he almost wanted to eat him, and the prince wasn’t completely certain of the impossibility.

He was rarely out of Ramsay’s sight anymore. He accompanied him to meals, to the dungeons, to his baths. Though they didn’t speak of the proposal again, its presence was a constant weight in the air between them. The matter was far from closed but a blood oath couldn’t be forced; it required full and explicit consent to be binding. Ramsay had seemingly made the decision to bide his time and break his prisoner down a bit more before pressing the issue again.

He could feel Ramsay’s frustration coiling under his skin like a kettle set to boil, a living tempest ready to break at any moment. As the physical toll of daily punishment and nightly carnality built, Theon was living in daily anxiety for the day his lord would finally snap.

Reprieve finally came in the form of a summoning from the Dread Lord. Even Ramsay - or perhaps especially him - could not refuse his father.

He’d released Theon’s ankles with a beleaguered sigh and irritably rolled off the bed, re-clasping his belt as he went. “Behave yourself until I get back or I’m piercing your nipples with the nastiest fish hooks I can find.”

And then he was gone like a gust of wind out the door. Theon waited a few moments before rolling off his back with a wince. The whole of his body was endlessly sore for various reasons. His chest had been flogged the day before, his thighs caned the day before that, and his back was not yet fully healed from its appointment with Ramsay’s whip.

For want of something to do he went through the mindless motions of tidying the chamber, which had begun to slip somewhat since the Huntsman had found other ‘uses’ for Theon’s time. It wouldn’t be surprising if Ramsay’s recent bout of distraction was the reason for his father’s summoning.

Theon had set to collecting Ramsay’s discarded clothes from the day prior. He was loosely folding them for laundry when an iron key toppled from the trouser pocket with a dull clatter.

For a long moment he only stared at it. A trick? A test? Ramsay had been so temperamental lately, his emotions so turbulent and volatile. It was believable that he could have just… forgotten.

_Leave it alone. He’d be so pleased with you. You know how good that feels-_

Theon grimaced. That weak, desperate thing was a part of himself he wished he could cut out with one of the Huntsman’s blades.

_It’s still winter out there. You have nowhere to go. You have no one._

It didn’t matter. Ramsay was growing harder and harder to appease, nigh impossible to calm. It was only a matter of time before he did something truly drastic.

No one looked twice when Theon padded down to the privacy of the kennels. Those he passed barely registered the laundry basket under his arm, didn’t notice at all that he was wearing proper shoes.

The air was so cold in the kennels that it almost choked him to breathe it. The hellhounds hardly seemed bothered, barely chuffing at his presence and ears twitching in disinterest. It was the dead middle of winter, the height of the Huntsman’s dominion, and a very bad time for the mad god to be even more unstable than he usually was.

The shackles fell from Theon’s ankles with little ceremony but the prince was still left shaking. He unfurled a cloak from the laundry basket and slipped into the shadows.

* * *

The Huntsman’s realm was a labyrinth of woodlands and frost, where the paths twisted back onto themselves and the trees couldn’t be trusted. The forest was both active and isolated: the shrubbery rustled and the growls of unseen beasts could sometimes be heard, but it was terribly rare to encounter another living being.

The living was not the problem.

Theon tore through the brush, dodging the reaching arms of thorned bramble and winter-bare branches. His shoes protected his feet but he was still drenched from shin to knee from wading through the high snow.

Shadows and silhouettes moved and flickered around him, murmuring words that he didn’t dare listen to.

_“You’re going the wrong way. Follow me, I can show you…“_

_“There’s no way out of here. Might as well turn around and give in now-”_

_“Have you seen my daughter? Please, tell me you’ve seen her!“_

The voices overlapped and blended into one another until they were nothing but noise drowning out the thoughts in Theon’s own mind.

The sound of the Huntsman’s horn echoing across the trees had them all silenced. The specters bled back and away, fleeing into the trees. Theon followed their example and broke into a mad sprint.

The cursed wood was a labyrinth with multiple trails but only one true path - all roads led to the Dreadfort, but all directions also led to the border if you could keep from being derailed and maintained a straight line.

The horn sounded again, closer this time.

Theon no longer felt the cold as wind pushed against him and snow crumpled underfoot. His blood was hot, pounding in his ears.

The blow came from the side and without warning. Hellhounds were funny like that. Despite being roughly half the size of the more solitary direwolf, the beasts were dangerously coordinated and strategic pack hunters. Especially if they had a strong alpha. Which they did.

The wind was knocked clear from Theon’s lungs as he was thrown back into the snow. A full mouth of dagger-like fangs was the last thing he saw before a tongue wider than his hand began slobbering across his face.

He choked and tried to push the 200-pound monstrosity of fur and muscle off him to little avail. His relief came when a second beast approached from behind to harmlessly grasp him by his collar and drag him backwards through the woods. Theon’s continued struggles went largely unnoticed as the hounds circled him, tails and tongues wagging for love of the game.

“Alright girls, that’s enough.”

The hounds immediately released him and withdrew, romping amongst themselves in the snow. Ramsay smoothly dismounted from his horse, cloak billowing in the winter breeze.

“Did you enjoy that?” His tone was light, but his eyes were like stone. “The pack did, at least. They’ve always been soft for you; must recognize one of their own.”

“My lo-“

Something in Ramsay’s gaze made his words die in his throat.

“Right then." He casually brushed his hands together, particles of ice drifting to the ground. "I’m curious. Where exactly were you running to?”

Theon took a shaky breath. “I’d take my chances anywhere else.”

“It looks like you already have,” Ramsay said flatly. “Let me know how that went for you.”

“I-“

“If you don’t shut your mouth I will take out every one of your teeth and make you eat them,” Ramsay hissed with deadly calm. “You chose a _very _poor time to test me, prince.”

The last thing Theon knew was the heel of Ramsay’s boot and the crunch of impact. Then there was only darkness.

* * *

Theon expected to wake in the dungeon, strapped to a saltire with a tray of knives laid out before him.

The first thing he became aware of was the cold. He was lying on something hard and metallic, a gelid wind that smelled of nature blowing over him. His face felt glazed and sticky, his nose broken.

The next thing he noted was the _sounds _\- the familiar slick, soft scrape of a knife shearing flesh, accompanied by muffled, incoherent whimpers.

Theon coughed wetly and spat out a wad of coagulated blood that had settled in his throat. The world tilted as he unsteadily lifted his head and blinked blearily around him. He was in a cage, the kind that was sometimes used to transport or confine new additions to the pack.

“You make it very difficult, you know.”

Theon flinched so violently his head knocked back against the bars. The cage was placed in a forest clearing, lit by a half-circle of braziers. Multiple crosses had been assembled within the area and Ramsay was stationed at one, his blade skimming over the half-flayed mess of what had once been a man.

Beyond him was stone altar.

Theon had been brought to one of the Huntsman’s sacrificial podiums. That probably wasn’t good.

“You always have," Ramsay continued. His voice was deceptively calm, a vacant tone that warned of a storm on the horizon. "I don’t mind. It’s no fun if it’s easy. You want me to earn it and I respect that. You and I just don’t seem to be on the same _page.”_

At least in that they could both agree. The whole situation was damn near baffling to Theon.

“Don’t you understand that I’m offering everything you want? A home. A purpose. Everything you’ve always sniveled after and been rejected for.”

Theon scowled. “Well maybe I want a home where I can actually be safe -“

“No you don’t,” Ramsay sneered. “You want to be owned. You want to _belong._ You want to know that you’ll be taken care of and never cut loose. Poor Prince Theon. The extra son, the extra Stark. Always the burden, always so fucking _expendable._”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Don’t I? Even to your precious Robb, you know you’ll never be his first priority. You could give him all of yourself and still come second to his _real_ family. He’d trade you for them in a heartbeat if he had to.” Ramsay punctuated his words with a particularly cruel stroke of his blade, his victim giving a half-lucid convulsion. “But not me. I’ll never let you go. I wouldn’t give you up for anything_, _for anyone! I’d burn the whole fucking world down if you asked me to and all I want is for you to be _mine_. Why is that so fucking hard!?”

_He wants to own you_, the voice came unbidden, whispered from within the vault where that abhorrent creature had been sealed. _Every part of you. Body, mind, and -_

Oh. The one part of Theon that he only ever surrendered when his body and mind were all but destroyed, when the Huntsman learned that claiming his prize meant warping it beyond recognition. The pyrrhic victory was also a short-lived one, only lasting until spring since Theon was still a dirty faker and never quite as dead inside as he appeared.

_He wants my heart,_ he thought with no lack of awe._ He wants me to _love_ him._

Well. Shit.

Theon had always recoiled from Ramsay’s sickly sweetness, his razor-sharp affections. It was why as winter wore on and his will began to crumble, the creature took over to do the things Theon found too unspeakable. Accepting Ramsay’s love was at the top of the list.

“I never asked for you. Never asked for the way you make me feel. It took a while, but unlike you I am capable of accepting my reality like a man.” Ramsay sighed. “You’re slow. I’ve always known that. And winter’s never long enough to train you like you need.”

“My lord…”

Ramsay solemnly held up a finger to silence him.

“You make me do it, you know. You bring it on yourself. It’d be so much easier if you could just give in without forcing me to completely break you first. I enjoy your spirit, I really do. But I’ve shared you with the world for long enough, I think.”

Theon felt a chill run down his spine as Ramsay turned to him, pointedly dusting off his trousers with frost in his gaze.

“This isn’t some winter holiday, prince. I don’t care if I have to cut off your damn feet this time, if all that’s left of you to own when we’re done is your _bones_. One way or another you’ll be mine and everyone’s going to fucking know it.”

Slowly, cautiously, a mad plan began to take shape in the Prince’s mind. Inside him was knowledge of the Huntsman’s needs and weaknesses, how he liked to be touched and treated. Theon only needed to buy himself time, to soothe Ramsay’s bruised ego until spring. It was either set aside his pride and play at surrender, or let it actually be forced upon him.

“You’d get bored,” Theon said, voice hoarse. “Without your games you’ll get bored. You’ll… you’ll throw me away.”

Ramsay stopped in his tracks.

“Is that what you think?” He asked, voice tight.

The best lies had grains of truth to them. Ramsay knew what Theon’s own fears were, knew about the needy weaknesses he fostered deep inside. It was almost easy to let the raw sincerity of his insecurities bleed through his words.

“You’ll want me until you have me, and then you won’t care anymore. What will I do then?”

Ramsay was looking at him strangely, his expression warring between hunger and suspicion.

“No one ever wants me to keep,” Theon said, a genuine tremor in his voice as he purposely opened his own wounds. “Not my family, not the North King. You’ll change your mind too and leave me with nothing. You’re asking me to trust you and I don’t know how.”

_But I want to_ was left unspoken but not unheard.

Ramsay swallowed, his emotions carefully boarded away once more. Theon bit his tongue. He had given a little bit of ground, given him something to think about. Too much too fast would give it all away.

The Huntsman gestured at the edge of the clearing and suddenly the cage door was being wrenched open. A pair of ghouls Theon hadn’t even noticed were hauling him out and to the altar. He didn't struggle as he was laid on his back upon the stone, steel restraints shackling him in place.

Ramsay leisurely polished his blade as he approached, eyes glittering and unreadable.

“You’ve been very bad, pet. What’s to be done about that?”

“I… I need to be punished.” Theon didn’t have to fake his resigned misery.

“That’s right.” Ramsay braced his fingers against Theon’s nose and pressed it back into place with a sickening crack. “What do you say?”

“Th-thank you my lord,” Theon choked out as fresh blood flowed from his nostrils and down his throat.

“Good. Let’s not waste any more time then.”

Hours passed with agonizing slowness. A flurry of snow began to fall as the night wore on. At some point the forgotten man on the nearby cross bled out and died quietly.

The skin from the soles of Theon’s feet was carefully flayed away and he was numb to the loss. It wasn’t like he’d be given reign to walk around anytime soon regardless. He also knew he was being watched for any sign of a crack in his demeanor: a twitch of resentment in his features, a flash of hatred in his deep ocean eyes. Ramsay was searching and he wasn’t going to find it.

Such a strange new game they were now playing: two unlovable men each trying to prove that he could be trusted.

“I could make you promises too,” Ramsay whispered, fingers running along Theon’s trembling skin as he set his bloody knife aside. “You can ask, within reason. I’ll swear it for you.”

Theon tried to hide his doubt. He was fairly sure “don’t hurt me anymore” went beyond the Huntsman’s idea of a reasonable request.

But he could walk the line. He could be dutiful without being destroyed, loyal but still sane. He could tease Ramsay with the prospect of having it - having him - both ways. He could channel the creature inside him and lean into his captor's touches, endure the torture without protest or complaint. He could let Ramsay into his body and _give_, just a bit, just enough.

Theon gave himself permission to stop fighting (_just for now_) and it was a terrible relief.

When Ramsay finished bandaging his work and undid the shackles, Theon only lay there and watched him with subdued interest.

The Huntsman had always made a game of dissecting the Prince’s psyche but the mad god had tipped his own hand on more than one occasion, showing in the brief and unintentional moments of vulnerability that he was equally starved for affection and acceptance.

_You think you’ve got all the power here,_ Theon thought, unsteady hand brushing through Ramsay’s hair as biting kisses were laid into his neck. _You’re wrong._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So apparently I don't know how long this fic is going to be, and I never did.  
Fingers crossed for good news at the Emmy's, though my expectations are low since these things are always rigged.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So our boy didn't get an Emmy. I am disappointed and unsurprised.

Winter passed slowly.

It always did, but time moved slower still when confined to the Huntsman’s bed. The situation equal parts dull and degrading but there wasn’t much alternative. Theon’s feet were no longer able to bear his weight and that wouldn’t be changing anytime soon.

Most days he was left to his own devices, wasting away in Ramsay’s chambers as his lord went about his duties. Guards were constantly stationed at the door, presumably as bored as he was. Days had begun to blend together.

It was almost a relief when Ramsay returned, just to break the monotony.

“Another busy day?” He asked mockingly, shedding his cloak to the floor.

Ramsay boyishly climbed atop the bed, boots and breeches and all, and Theon winced as the mattress jostled.

“Just waiting for you, my lord.”

“I imagine so,” Ramsay said, chin resting on Theon’s chest. “I expect you’ve been lonely, cloistered away like this.”

“It… helps to know you’re coming back.” It wasn’t even a lie, given that Theon had spent many a night entombed in the kennels or the dungeons wondering if he’d finally been forgotten.

Ramsay’s brow twitched - a reflexive response to whenever Theon gave an answer that was a little too good, a little too endearing. Sometimes the Huntsman wanted to stay angry, but the Prince knew him too thoroughly to make it easy.

He scoffed and broke gaze. “You’re being punished you dull animal, and getting off easy if we’re both being honest. My father used to do the something similar, you know: locking me up to ‘keep me out of trouble.’ It’s your own fault if I have to discipline you like a child.”

Of all the things Theon was loathe to imagine, Ramsay’s upbringing was near the top of the list.

“I know.”

Ramsay was still mad about the escape attempt, but actually _less_ volatile now than he’d been beforehand. Apparently the flaying had been cathartic for him, with the dangerous, restless rage ignited by Myranda’s remarks since dissipating. That night he had carried Theon through the snow and back to the keep, bandaged the wounds with rough but diligent hands, and laid him down in his bed instead of a dungeon cell.

_ “You’ve shed blood on my altar, prince. I’ll be able to follow your scent from a world away.” _

“We just can’t risk you upsetting your wounds, love. You’re lucky that I have a soft spot for watching you totter about. If they get infected I’ll have to take your feet in earnest,” Ramsay said, sickly sweet. “Though maybe I should regardless. It would mean no more incidents, certainly. You’d be safe and sound in my chambers forever, nothing more than my bedwarmer. Can’t get up to any trouble that way, can you?”

Theon nearly scoffed. He couldn't get up to anything like this - just wait until the Huntsman got bored.

He said nothing and tried to smother the embers of his scorn.

The revelation that Ramsay wanted the prince to love him had taken a while to sink in, with something so basic and sentimental seeming beyond the madman. Once it did, Theon felt like he could finally see the forest for the trees - although it wasn’t yet clear how much good the knowledge might do him.

He continually tried to remind himself that he’d once been a god of indulgence. If he couldn’t charm a feral beast that was already obsessed with him, there was no hope for any of it.

“I’m grateful, truly. And I’m happy to not be left in the dungeons,” Theon said cautiously. “I just… being alone with my thoughts isn’t easy, my lord.”

It was disconcerting just how little Theon actually had to lie to Ramsay. Was it all still an act, even if near every word out of his mouth was honest? _More_ honest and open than he’d ever been before?

Ramsay was giving him a strange sort of look, one which had begun to grace his features more and more often these days. He always quickly boarded his feelings away before they could be properly examined.

Theon cleared his throat uncomfortably. “What did you do today? While you were gone.”

Ramsay shrugged and gave a languid stretch, joints cracking. “Nothing terribly interesting. Another storm blew in this week. We got a fresh set of sacrifices, though I haven’t gotten to play with them yet. Dungeon’s going to get crowded at this rate but it’s no matter. I can always set a few loose and let the hounds chase them down.”

Theon shivered. The hellbeasts would surely not be as kind with their quarry as they were with him. When the prince ran, the pack thought it was a game. For everyone else, it was dinner.

“Has anybody ever gotten as far as I did?”

Something in Ramsay’s eyes visibly thawed.

“No,” he said. “Not ever.”

They stayed like that for a while, just breathing each other’s air. There had been more contemplative silence between them lately. It wasn’t uncomfortable, though Theon wished he could hear whatever was passing behind those slate-blue eyes as they stared down at him.

“You don’t know what day it is, do you?”

Theon blinked. Time was strange and distorted in the Huntsman’s realm under the best of circumstances. It had felt like deepwinter when he tried to escape, but that wasn’t a reliable measure. How long had it been since then? A fortnight, perhaps?

“Well, never mind that. You’ll find out soon enough,” Ramsay said. “There’s a little gathering I’m meant to oversee this evening, and I find myself very reluctant to leave you unattended these days. At least not for prolonged periods. It seems that whenever I let you out of my sight you start getting all sorts of nasty thoughts.”

Theon looked pointedly at his feet, his flayed soles thrumming painfully within their bandages. He wasn’t running anywhere anytime soon, nor was he stupid enough to stoke the Huntsman’s anger when he was even more at the mad god’s mercy than usual.

“Anywhere I go you’ll have to carry me, my lord.”

Ramsay cruelly threaded their fingers together, causing Theon’s brittle bones to creak. “That suits me just fine.”

* * *

When Theon was carried from the Huntsman’s chambers he saw that the whole of the fortress was abustle with activity. Servants flitted to and fro, laden with food or candles or furnishings. Shades bled in and out of view as firelight disrupted the shadows.

As they passed through the entrance hall Theon’s stomach clenched at the sight of the hunting party donning their gear.

“Easy. It’s not for you,” Ramsay murmured into his ear. “You can’t give anyone a good chase the way you are now.”

Theon was taken to the carriage house and promptly locked inside of a prison wagon. He’d never seen it before, having always been stolen away on the Huntsman’s own horse, but it didn’t surprise him that the Dreadfort had one. The wood floor was marred by dark stains, but at least Ramsay had possessed enough good manners to throw some furs inside to keep Theon from freezing.

He had been more prone to odd little gestures like that lately, mixing kindness in with the degradation. They might have landed better if they weren’t only softening pain the man himself caused, but Theon knew better than to be ungrateful.

It creaked ominously as it trundled through the forest, a pair of hellhounds yipping and padding alongside. Theon burrowed deeper into the furs, watching the trees pass through the cage bars. There were a few other riders in the procession, but they were mainly the Huntsman’s clerics: formerly human devotees that had passed all his absurd tests. Theon had earlier heard the hunting party and the rest of the pack tear through the brush and eventually out of earshot, off to harass and ravage the world beyond.

They finally came to a massive lakeside glade. The immediate area was illuminated by a wide ring of torches, a marble throne framed in roots and thorns was elevated at the head of the clearing. The firelight glanced ominously off of the large, round stone altar at the center. Further off a set of long wooden tables had been assembled, set but not yet laden with food.

Now that they were out of the dense maze of the trees Theon could clearly see the moon above, full and heavy and gleaming gold.

“Figured it out yet?” Ramsay dismounted his horse and handed the reigns off to one of his attendants. “I think this is the first one of these I’ve brought you to. It’s hard to believe after all this time.”

Not really. Luminalia was the latewinter festival, an exercise of drunken revelry and debauchery. Facetiously called a ‘winter harvest’, it was meant to inspire and celebrate light, heat and fertility even in the coldest season, whilst also serving as a sort of last hurrah for the wintertide.

Theon had never attended because usually by this point he’d barely be a person anymore: broken and fragile both in mind and body, incapable of leaving the fortress or enduring the chill let alone the noise.

He had certainly always been present for what happened afterwards however, when the Huntsman returned drunk and well-fed and eager for one last ‘celebration’ before the gold moon passed.

This cycle Theon was in far better condition than he might have ever been before. He was still missing fingers and toes and patches of skin, but the torture had been decently paced and the injuries diligently tended to afterwards. He had spent more time in the Huntsman’s bed than in the dungeon or the kennels, so filth and infection had been given less opportunity to settle in.

It was too soon to be glad or congratulate himself on finally learning the secret to playing the Huntsman’s moods and ego. It felt disconcertingly like Ramsay had gone easy on him, as if holding back from utterly dismantling his captive was what passed as kindness in that twisted mind.

It was still too soon to say. Winter was in its twilight, but it was not over yet.

* * *

When Theon was pulled from the carriage he was made very aware of his state of undress. The night was clear and the air was still, torches and braziers offering some measure of heat, but he was still shielded only by furs and one of the Huntsman’s larger shirts. Not that Ramsay was likely to care if Theon lost a toe or two to frostbite.

It seemed painfully typical of the mad god’s thinking that he would hunt down and take the eyes of a man who walked in on the prince’s bath, but wouldn’t let Theon leave the keep with trousers.

“My men can look if they want,” Ramsay said knowingly as Theon ensconced his legs in another pelt, nested on the throne’s platform with the two hellhounds jostling at his side. “They understand who you belong to.”

As the votaries built a proper bonfire by the lakeside Theon sat in his apprehension, idly patting the hound that had put its head in his lap. His own collar was heavy around his throat.

“You stay right there and don’t speak unless I tell you to.” Ramsay’s eyes were trained on the edge of the clearing, where new figures had begun to emerge.

Most young women, but a handful of men as well. All human, all bundled against the cold and bearing dark burlap sacks in hand. They converged at the huge round altar, each of them reaching into their bags to deposit a different gory offering.

A skull, a severed hand, an assortment of bloody masses that could only be various organs.

“It’s our winter harvest,” Ramsay said, hand resting on the back of Theon’s neck. “Don’t you like it?”

Theon stifled a wince. Luminalia was a traditionally a celebration of endurance and fostering of hope against the cold; apparently the Huntsman used it as a final reaping of offerings before his realm closed its doors to the mortal plane.

They watched as the devotees arranged their gifts around the rim of the altar, torches flaring as their lips moved with their prayers. The bonfire blazed high and bright, the tables nearly made ready for the feast.

It was always kind of funny, what deities would catch on and with whom. Usually it came down to whether the bards took a liking to your story, and unfortunately there was only one story of Theon’s that seemed to matter anymore. The Huntsman had an engaging story himself apparently, as well as a compelling aesthetic, and the two factors combined so that even a former half-breed could establish a strong foundation with the mortals.

“We’ve got a few absences.” Ramsay tsked, looking over his assembled cult. “It appears that not everyone could retrieve their quarry. A shame, but there’s always at least one who can’t measure up.”

As if on cue, the boom of the hunting horn echoed across the woods. The painful familiarity of it startled Theon so badly he jumped, head knocking into the Huntsman’s marble throne.

Ramsay snorted a laugh, his thumb rubbing at the bump on Theon’s temple.

“Don’t hurt yourself. That’s only _my_ right, don’t you know?”

Moments later the hunting party burst through the trees in an uproar of aggressive elation. Horses and hounds and ghouls thundered across the clearing, a handful of bound and bleeding humans dragged between them.

“Well this is an unfortunate disappointment,” Ramsay said, imperiously lounging in his seat. “I thought I’d been so reasonable, too. Gave you all plenty of time, let you choose who to kill. I understand there aren’t many old and infirm left this latewinter, but surely you could’ve found _some_ easy prey if you were desperate?”

He held his hand up to silence their half-formed pleas.

“I don’t care about excuses. I still need a liver, a kidney and left lung for my altar, and since you failed me…” He motioned at his assembled cultists, the successful ones still lingering off to the side. “Whoever puts the boons on the altar gets extra favor from me. If you mangle the organs, you’re on the block.”

The hunting party retreated and the humans instantly fell on each other like beasts, cutting and clawing and screaming until no sense of order could be made out in the melee. Theon shrunk away from the sight only for cruel hands to tangle in his hair.

“Don’t you dare close your eyes. I want you to watch,” Ramsay snapped. “I want you to watch and know how good I am to you. Any one of those animals would kill to sit in your place.”

Hot breath caressed his ear.

“But I don’t want them. They’re all just meat. I’ve only got eyes for you, you wretched dog. Thank me.”

He felt his heart flutter and immediately hated himself for it. He was awful, sick and broken. Disgusting for clamoring for every scrap of praise and hint that someone thought he was special. He was terrible, and Ramsay was even worse.

“I-“ Theon’s throat caught as a strangled scream tore through the glade. “I’m very g-grateful my lord.”

“Sure you are.”

Eventually each slot around the altar was occupied by a grisly offering. The grass of the clearing was stained dark and damp. Bodies were hauled away and thrown to the hellhounds, who descended with a rabid fervor of their own.

For some reason everyone else thought this was a wonderful time to start the feast. Theon watched as the servants distributed food and wine to the energized masses, his own appetite gone and replaced with hollow nausea.

It was a dark perversion of the summer solstice that Theon used to help oversee along with various other gods of pleasure and nature. Men had painted their chests with symbols of good fortune and women had worn garlands of flowers in their hair. They had lit fires and had sex under the stars, full from the summer harvest. Theon would be made bright and dizzy with offerings of sweet wine and silk clothes.

That was such a long time past now. These days his worship was much more solemn. It came from bowmen and lost travelers and wayward youths, salt wives and thralls and survivors. Abandoned wretches who had no one else.

Ramsay watched the revelry from his throne, eating from a silver tray placed at his side. Eventually he gave Theon a rough nudge with his foot.

“Come on then. It’s a feast and you look bloody miserable,” he said, a chalice extended. “You used to like wine, didn’t you?”

“I did,” Theon said cautiously. “I don’t really… drink anymore.”

_When I drink I feel helpless, I think of you and I speak of you and what if someone _ ** _hears_ ** _-_

“I know.” Ramsay looked at him plainly, glass extended. “I’m telling you to.”

Horns of danger were sounding off in Theon’s brain. It had to be a trick or a trap, but he had no choice but to take the cup with trembling hands.

The wine was heady but sweet, a flavor he had often tasted secondhand on Ramsay’s tongue.

“Very good. Now eat.”

Theon stared at the meat, red and dripping, and tried desperately not to think of human flesh slashed and bloody.

“…I might be ill.”

“That would be very rude of you.” Ramsay’s expression was unmoved and expectant.

Theon’s stomach squirmed in protest as he took the cut between his teeth. He stared into stormy eyes just to keep the gory images from invading his brain. He swallowed thickly, the meat a lump going down his throat.

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?”He asked, hand outstretched for Theon to lick the fat from his fingers. “At least I hope not. We’re far from done after all.”

* * *

Ramsay made sure to fill Theon’s stomach with food and wine. It’d been so long that it didn’t take much before the prince felt well and truly drunk. His body was now warm against the nighttime chill and his eyes surveyed the revelry with a detached interest. The festivities had gotten progressively rowdy and violent as the alcohol continued to flow, but Theon couldn’t bring himself to be especially troubled.

A slight haze blurred the corners of his vision as he watched the feasting, brawling and fucking taking place before them. Leaning against the Huntsman’s leg was easier than being upright and he idly rubbed circles into the other man’s calf, comfortably sat between his legs.

Ramsay was deep in his cups as well, hands roving over the prince’s shoulders and absently pawing at his shirt. Theon felt Myranda’s heated gaze across the way before he’d even registered her, the woman passing in and out of focus.

“She’s waiting for the last rite of the evening,” Ramsay murmured into his ear. “I usually pick her, though I sometimes take a disciple if they’ve impressed me well enough. Do you want to choose? Since I know you got _so_ upset last time.”

It took a few seconds for the information to process in Theon’s dulled brain. When it did he felt a cold rush flow through his chest. His hand instinctively tightened on Ramsay’s leg.

The other man noted this in silence and Theon knew his expression had gone stone-cold blank. It seemed to happen whenever Ramsay was deep in his own head. Though he was vacant and stoic on the surface, internally it meant that he was awash with emotion and turbulent thoughts.

“Is there something you’d like to say?” His voice was deceptively hollow and offhand.

Theon breathed deep, absorbing the scents of the forest as they mingled with the smoke of the bonfire. The wine sung and swirled in his veins.

“Do you have to?” His tongue felt heavy in his mouth.

“Yes.”

“Do I… do I have to watch?”

The Huntsman inhaled sharply, hand tightening on Theon’s nape.

“_Yes. _If I hear you’ve looked away for even a moment I’ll pick up where I left off and flay you ankle to knee.”

It shouldn’t have bothered him but it did. Theon had seen it once before, this tangible proof that he was the Huntsman’s but the Huntsman wasn’t _his_. He didn’t want to watch it again. He didn’t want to feel so discarded and insignificant to the one person who was supposed to covet and hunger for him over all others.

Maybe it was the wine. Maybe the wine was the excuse.

“Can it be anyone?”

Another loaded pause.

“It’s an altar of oblations. You know what means? They have to give themselves to me freely. They have to let me in.”

“Oh.”

Theon didn’t always fight the Huntsman when it came to sex but he had never been an active participant either. He climaxed if and when Ramsay wanted him to, not because he’d pursued it. Mostly he just let the man have his way with him, body forfeit but heart and soul locked safely away.

The silence stretched on. Finally Ramsay made a sound that was almost a laugh, but humorless and bitter. He moved to stand and Theon’s arms automatically locked around his leg, breaking his stride.

“… What are you doing?” His tone was surprised and confused. Unnerved.

Theon’s heart was thrumming. His head swam with nerves and alcohol.

“I don’t want to watch you with anyone else,” he said, staring determinedly at the ground. “It’s not fair.”

Ramsay must have been truly bewildered because he didn’t even scoff at the latter comment.

“I can… I can do it.” Theon looked up to meet his gaze, sea-green locking onto ice-blue. “I want to do it.”

Ramsay continued to stare, even as he wordlessly took Theon’s hand and lifted him up. The tension between them was palpable and had seemingly spread throughout the rest of the glade. The formerly boisterous crowd had gone quiet.

“The hell are you doing?” Myranda demanded. “He’s going to ruin everything!”

“Back up, will you.”

“The flesh has to be _offered_, Ramsay.” She ignored him, trailing his heels.

“It will be.”

“Now he’s truly infected your mind,” she said with disgust. “You can force that mongrel to do a lot of things, but you can’t make him want you!”

Ramsay’s grip tightened on Theon’s thighs. If his hands hadn’t been full it didn’t bear imagining what he might have done in that moment. He stared coldly ahead at nothing as he placed Theon on the altar’s edge and let the prince cautiously inch back towards the center.

The altar was even more massive up close, which was great because it meant Theon could lie in the middle and not be within arm’s reach of a drying human heart. It was less ideal because it made him feel even more small and vulnerable.

Ramsay’s face remained wooden, his gaze worlds away as Myranda’s words continued to wash over him.

“-fucking game has gone on long enough,” she was saying. “You’re going to sabotage your own ceremony for this baseless obsession. It’s _pathetic_. I’ve been with you from the beginning and I’m not going to let you destroy yourself over some spoiled, simpering brat!”

She made an angry move towards her lord which was apparently a step too far. Without even being prompted two other ghouls quickly grabbed her by the shoulders and hauled her back.

Theon found himself fixated. He’d taken lunges at Ramsay before, usually in early winter, and no one ever stopped him. He assumed it was because the men knew their lord more than capable of putting the meager threat down himself (which was embarrassingly correct). Yet now that he thought back on it, Theon couldn’t remember if any of them had ever actually touched him without first being explicitly told to do so. Not even when he’d attacked Ramsay.

“Myranda,” Ramsay’s voice was deadly calm as he removed his gloves and handed them off to an attendant shade. “It occurs to me that some clarifications need to be made between us.”

She watched him with a mixture of fear and indignation as he turned to her.

“If I’ve been spoiling anyone, apparently it’s you. Somehow you think you’re entitled to insult me. To criticize my decisions.”

“Rams-“

“_What_ was that?”

Myranda swallowed. “Lord Huntsman. I only meant-“

“I know what you meant. Allow me to make something plain to you.” Ramsay stepped into her space, his voice soft but clear to the otherwise dead silence. “You do not ‘let’ me do anything. In the future if I do not solicit your opinion, and I can’t imagine I will, and I hear it anyway? I will cut your tongue out with a rusty fucking blade.”

Myranda said nothing but her eyes had gone wet with unshed tears. Ramsay took a step back and continued unclasping his cloak.

“I don’t have the time or patience to punish you at the moment, so here’s what we’ll do. I’m going to carry out my final rite and you’re going to stand there and watch. Every. Second. Of it. Understood?” He didn’t wait for an answer before turning away and shedding his shirt.

Theon reflexively shrunk back as the Huntsman climbed atop the altar.

Ramsay scowled, working his trousers down to mid-thigh. “If you’re going to run, do it now. I will not have this fucking ritual botched.”

Theon collected himself and shook his head. “I’m not running.”

Something raw passed behind Ramsay’s eyes. He then quickly pushed Theon to lie flat upon the altar, as if the gesture would cover up his flicker of weakness.

The stone was so cold against Theon’s fevered skin that it nearly burned, stealing the breath from his lungs. The light of the gold moon overhead filled his eyes.

There was the sound of an airtight seal being opened, followed by the slick noise of oil and flesh. Some of the strain in Theon’s chest eased. Ramsay didn’t usually bother with lubrication, but apparently tonight truly was a special occasion.

He positioned himself between Theon’s legs with uncharacteristic hesitation.

“Amidst these offerings of bone, blood and sin,” Ramsay said. “Do you share your flesh with me willingly?”

For a terrifying moment the words caught in Theon’s throat. This was mad. He had finally gone well and truly mad.

He needed more wine.

“Yes my lord,” he choked out.

Ramsay’s eyes shone so bright in the moonlight that one could swear they’d begun to glow.

“So be it,” he said, ripping the borrowed shirt from Theon’s frame. “I _accept_.”

Fingers breached Theon’s entrance hot and slick, the stretch only mildly uncomfortable when held against what he’d endured before. He made an effort to relax and surrender to what was happening but he was soft from apprehension and unease, the eyes of numerous spectators leaving him flushed and ashamed.

For his part Ramsay was only half-hard; presumably Myranda’s outburst had taken some of the wind from his sails. That wouldn’t do. It was too late to go back and Theon wasn’t going to bear the consequences of failure. They had committed to this bad decision, this culmination of the many mistakes and pains they’d inflicted on each other over the years, and now they were going to see it through.

Theon cleared his throat. “I can take more.”

Ramsay was unreadable as he looked him over. If Theon had to guess he’d say the other man was nervous, but the very idea seemed absurd. They’d fucked a thousand times before.

Theon shifted his hips, taking those fingers deeper of his own accord, and it was like a spell had been broken.

Ramsay grasped Theon’s pale thigh and added another finger, pressing deep to firmly massage those soft inner walls. He set a hard but steady rhythm, thrusting progressively deeper until a familiar spark ignited in the prince’s veins. That special spot within him rubbed and caressed, Theon felt his cock gradually fill with blood.

“Beautiful,” Ramsay murmured. “No matter what I do to you, even at your worst you still make me want you. The audacity of talking to me about what’s not fucking _fair_-“

He pressed that spot again and wrung a groan from Theon’s lips. It was the words just as much as the stimulation that were doing it, with all those pitiful insecurities and disgusting need for validation bubbling to the surface.

“You’re a fucking tease is what you are, acting like you don’t feel the same. I know you don’t want to, but you _do._” Ramsay muttered, his mounting frustration poured into his fingers’ merciless work. “Now look at you, moaning and leaking on my altar. Filthy _slut_.”

He pulled out, leaving Theon gasping and empty.

“Don’t worry. I know what you need,” Ramsay said, coating himself in oil.

Theon wanted to close his eyes, to cover his face along with his shame, but Ramsay batted his hands away.

“Oh no, none of that. You don’t get to fucking hide. Swear that’s all you do, is run and hide from me. Not tonight.” Ramsay spread Theon’s cheeks, cock aligning with his entrance. Whatever reservations he’d had must have been reconciled because his manhood was now fully erect.

Theon’s teeth dug into his lip until he tasted blood on his tongue. His body thrummed with a mixture of arousal and alcohol as he shakily positioned his legs around Ramsay’s hips.

“And all _you_ do is toy with me,” he bit out. “Just do it already.”

“Desperate are we?”

Theon scowled. “Impatient, more li-“

The sudden first thrust still shook him to his core, despite or perhaps because of the preparation. His body was warmed up and receptive in a way it often wasn’t, welcoming and pliant. His back arched off the altar as Ramsay slid inside.

It took a few moments but he once bottomed out they both took a second to breathe, appreciating the tight heat and intense fullness respectively. Theon took a moment to adjust to the hard length inside of him, so hot he could swear he felt it throb with Ramsay’s pulse.

Then Huntsman rolled his hips, grinding against Theon’s prostate and wrenching another groan from the prince’s chest.

They had done this so many times before, and yet Theon could feel him in ways he never had. The absence of stinging pain and brutal rhythm lent so much more to the experience: the slide of skin on skin, the gentle stretch and gradually building pleasure with each steady thrust.

It was disconcertingly intimate, especially as Theon wound his arms around Ramsay’s shoulders and leaned into his warmth.

“Is this what you wanted?” Ramsay panted into Theon’s neck as he incrementally quickened his pace. “Is my insolent bitch finally satisfied?”

“Ngh," Theon’s hands roved over the musculature of Ramsay’s back, his jagged nails scraping the fair skin. “I c-can take more.”

An animalistic growl rumbled from the Huntsman’s chest. The thrusts came harder, rubbing Theon in all the right places and setting his world alight with every stroke to his prostate.

Theon tried to meet his rhythm, hips grinding up instead of just lying still and taking it. Curses and vile words began to rain from Ramsay’s lips, hands gripping Theon’s thighs with bruising force.

The heat between them was mounting higher and higher, to the point that Theon no longer acknowledged the cold air against his bare skin. There was only Ramsay’s touch, his warmth, his pale eyes and the brilliant latewinter moon up above.

Theon locked his legs tighter around Ramsay’s waist as he felt the pace stutter.

“Are you close?” He whispered, balls tightening with another insistent caress to his prostate. “Going to spend inside me?”

“_Fuck_.” Ramsay hissed. “Yes. I’m going to mark you up like a whore, make you feel it-“

Theon cut him off by sinking his teeth into the exposed arch of Ramsay’s neck, darkly satisfied by the gasp of pain as blood vessels broke under the pressure. He ran his tongue over the damage, head swimming as he felt the cock inside him twitch.

He pressed a kiss to the bruise as it quickly blossomed. “Now I’ve marked _you_.”

It took him by surprise when he felt Ramsay shudder with a low moan, followed by the wet rush of heat as he spilled inside him.

The sheer rush of power was what sent Theon following him over the edge, drooling cock untouched when it released its seed on his stomach.

The world wobbled and tilted, all sense of gravity gone. Theon was floating, lightheaded and dizzy. It reminded him of drowning, of the exact moment before he was reborn and remade.

As he came back into his body he was made aware of the ritual’s magic tingling in his skin, of every point of contact between him and Ramsay as they lay tangled on the altar.

Theon had done a fair job of ignoring their audience thus far but he knew that once the afterglow faded the mortification would set in. He kept his gaze fixed on the sky, the endless expanse of stars laid before him, all presided over by the gold Luminalia moon.

Winter was nearly over.

* * *

What happened next was thankfully a blur to Theon’s exhausted and drunken mind. He remembered being left on the stone table for a while as the rites were closed out and the surviving human followers dismissed. He'd barely been aware for any of it, dazed and buzzing with the magic running through him. He was then bundled back into the furs and deposited into the wagon, where he ostensibly slipped out of consciousness.

They didn’t speak of that night in the passing days, but something had changed between them. It was hard to describe. They personally were the same - the Huntsman cruel and mocking, the Prince sullen and resigned - but the air in the room was different. Looser.

Theon still found himself punished on occasion, for sarcasm or laziness or some other excuse, but the encounters were milder and even more explicitly sexual. The Huntsman whispered filthy words as he worked him over with the flogger or the belt, he murmured praise for how well Theon took it when he traced red lines with his knife.

Theon didn’t enjoy it, but he realized he didn’t really hate it either.

Ramsay had additionally decided that he liked who Theon became when drunk: moody but honest, clingy and with his restraint near dulled to nothing.

Theon was reluctant at first. There were reasons why he’d set drink aside, after all. He didn’t like feeling slow and vulnerable, especially not with a constant threat of danger looming overhead. At the same time he had been swiftly reminded of all the reasons he’d fucking loved getting drunk, primarily the sweet freedom it granted him from the oppression of his own mind.

It had gradually became a part of their routine to drink together, after dinner when the keep had gone quiet for the night. In the past Theon would’ve been incapable of even imagining them both lying at the hearth of the Huntsman’s chambers, drunk and drinking and playing truth games like boys.

Somehow it had become the new reality.

“So tell me,” Ramsay said, head propped in his palm as they both lay sprawled on the bearskin rug. “Did you ever fuck the North King?”

Theon scowled into another sip of wine. He still didn’t quite understand the man’s fixation on Robb. It was flattering in an odd way, that someone thought the North King would ever make such a terrible decision on Theon’s account.

“No, my lord. I have never fucked any man aside from you.”

For a moment Ramsay looked pleased. Then a shadow crossed his features.

“Have you ever _wanted_ to fuck the North King?”

“That’s two questions.” Theon handed him back the bottle. “Did you really kill your brother?”

“Yes,” Ramsay replied easily and utterly without shame. “Slaying a god was one of my father’s tasks before he’d let me ascend. He should have been more specific.”

“That’s…”

“Ancient history, is what it is.” Ramsay shoved the bottle back. “You know my question.”

“Right.” Theon barely refrained from rolling his eyes. “Not really? We were always in an odd place between friends and brothers and I don’t know whatever else. There’s love between us, but never lust as far as I’m aware.”

Ramsay looked less than enthused with this answer, turning to glower at the fire.

“I’d kill him if I could. Just take him apart piece by piece until he’s _gone_.”

Theon was disturbed but not surprised.

“I’m rather sure there isn’t a person alive that you wouldn’t kill.” He paused, mind reaching for a question he’d never ask whilst sober. “Do you… love Myranda?”

He hadn’t seen her in a while. He didn’t want to know what happened to her, what punishment the Huntsman had levied for her words, but he found it hard to believe she’d be gone for good.

Ramsay blandly peered at him from his periphery.

“I like her. We have history. Shared tastes.” He shrugged. “That’s all.”

“She’s in love with you.”

“I’m aware.”

Theon stared. “So why the hell are you fucking around with me?”

Ramsay gave him a warning look as he took another drink. “Are you jealous?”

Theon scowled. He’d walked into that one.

His broody silence went on a second too long before Ramsay kicked him irritably. “Quit moping like a bitch and answer alre-“

“_Yes_, alright? Yes, it pisses me off to see you two together. I’m the one who’s bleeding for you day in day out, and then you go and fuck your whores like it’s nothing.” Theon took the bottle and drank deep, his head spinning. “It makes me feel inadequate, replaceable, which isn’t a feeling I’m unfamiliar with but coming from you it’s even worse.”

“Why’s it worse from me?” Ramsay asked, sounding smug.

_Because you’re the one who’s supposed to need me. The only one who does._

“Wait your turn_._” Theon huffed. “Why would you go through so much trouble for me when you know there’s already someone who loves you? You’ve said it yourself, it’s not like you’re pressed for options.”

Ramsay made a disgruntled noise.

“Look. The disciples are a means to an end, they’re expendable. Myranda included. If the day comes I owe it to kill her myself, but…” He waved his hand absently. “Enjoying her doesn’t mean I reciprocate her needs.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t. Let me put it this way: if murdering her had been one of my father’s tests, I would have done it without hesitation. Which is probably why it _wasn’t_, in hindsight.” Ramsay snorted. “And that was back when I was a half-blood and actually found her more relatable. Then I gained godhood and she lost humanity; I moved forward and she got frozen in place. She thinks she knows me and goes around as if nothing has changed.”

The dancing light from the fire was catching his eyes, making them glimmer like dying stars. In their depths Theon thought he caught a glimpse of that younger Ramsay: frustrated and displaced, proud but isolated and so lonely. An unwanted demigod with everything to prove.

_It doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t make up for what he’s done or who he is._

As if the fates knew his thoughts, he watched Ramsay’s eyes suddenly flash with something sly and sinister.

“You were an accident. A game that went too far. Maybe you’ve got your precious Robb to thank for it. I saw how incompetently he handled you and I thought, ‘I could do better’. Then every time I looked I was thinking about it. ‘I would have decked you across the mouth for that’ or ‘I would have given you a reward for this’.” He laughed roughly. “The image of you broken in at my feet wouldn’t leave my brain. I got hungry for it just by watching you.”

Ramsay pulled Theon closer, the empty wine bottle toppling and rolling hollowly away. They tangled together on the bearskin, fire crackling weakly.

“I knew you’d be good for me. We’re like puzzle pieces, you see? We’ve each got hollows in just the right places. We _fit_.” He clutched Theon’s jaw tight enough to bruise. “You want me to earn it? Fine. But there comes a point where you need to quit being a stubborn cunt and get the fuck onboard. So are we on the same page yet, prince?”

Theon looked up at him, wonder and fear at war inside his chest. There was a steep price, he decided, for truly knowing someone and being truly known in return. Especially when the parties involved were so vile.

“Yes,” he said, mouth dry. “We are.”

“_Good_.”

Then Ramsay’s mouth was on his, hot and insistent and both of them tasting like wine, their bodies burning brighter than the dying fire.

* * *

Theon could sense it when the seasons began to turn. Even in the Huntsman’s realm where it was always night and cold, he could sense it. It felt like an itch he couldn’t scratch; like someone he knew was calling him from a distance.

Ramsay slept heavily on the bed beside him, arm thrown possessively over the prince’s waist. He wasn’t an especially deep sleeper, but Theon had purposefully kept his cup full all night. They’d drunk together enough times now that it wasn’t considered strange or suspicious. The man hardly stirred when Theon slipped from beneath the furs.

There was something about the Huntsman when he slept. He looked almost innocent with his deceptively boyish features. It was all very frustrating.

The morning was nearly spent when he began to blink himself awake.

_He has the winter sky in his eyes_, Theon thought.

“Good morning my lord,” he said, sat at the foot of the bed. “Though it’ll be lunchtime soon enough.”

Ramsay grumbled incoherently and shifted between the sheets - it was at that point that he realized the problem.

“… What did you do.”

“I would have thought that was obvious.”

Ramsay tugged forcefully at the leather straps that now bound his wrists to the headboard. The bed shook but the binds held fast. They always did. Theon would know.

“I don’t know what you think you’re playing at,” Ramsay was fully awake now, a dangerous edge to his words. “Set me loose now and we’ll call it a bad joke, yes? You don’t want to test my patience-”

“Patience is something you could use an exercise in,” Theon said. “Very demanding, aren’t you? Always have been.”

“Theon-“

“Oh don’t worry. We’re just going to have a conversation, you and I. Make a game of it perhaps. You’re so fond of your games after all.” Theon pulled at the sheets and the furs, baring Ramsay’s skin to the thin air of the morning. “You haven’t been very kind to me, you know.”

Ramsay growled. “I’ve treated you better than you deserve, you faithless little-“

The open-handed slap rang sharply through the room. Theon’s hand stung from the force of it. Ramsay seemed too shocked to process the pain, a red mark blossoming on his cheek.

“You see, that’s what I mean. Not very nice at all. Besides, let’s be honest,” Theon said nastily. “_I’m_ hardly the greater slut here.”

He ran his hands down the fair skin of Ramsay’s torso, idly thumbing at his nipples before continuing southward. A strangled noise escaped as Theon grasped his cock, not erect but not completely soft either.

“Well that’s interesting,” Theon said. “I didn’t realize my lord had such diverse tastes.”

“I should cut off your hands,” Ramsay said, his jaw clenched so tight it looked painful. "I should have broken you when I had the chance."

“Maybe so.”

Theon rubbed at the underside of the shaft and felt it fill with blood. He kept a slow, experimental pace, his other hand sliding up one of the Huntsman’s strong thighs. He had curiously spread Ramsay’s cheeks, just to _look_, when he instantly felt the hardening cock in his grasp twitch.

His heart gave a skip as Ramsay’s face turned a deep, shameful red.

“… It’s nothing to feel ashamed of, my lord,” Theon said, practically giddy. “You know you only ever had to _ask_.”

“I’ll fucking kill you.”

“You’re cute when you’re shy. Who’d have thought?” Theon rubbed at that puckered entrance, feeling how the muscles fluttered under his touch. “Don’t worry, love. I’m not going to fuck you.”

A small noise escaped Ramsay’s throat. Surprised, confused. Perhaps disappointed.

“When that day comes, you won’t be bound. You’ll beg me for it. Disguise it as a command perhaps, if that makes you feel better. I’ll give it to you.”

He slipped his hand from between Ramsay’s thighs. A shudder rocked through the body that lay prone beneath him.

“I have a different idea. Want to hear it?”

“I want you to let me go so I can flay every inch of your worthless-“ The words were lost to a mixture of a gasp and a shout as Theon took his length into his mouth.

He had sucked him before, albeit rarely. Usually on occasions where his teeth were all but gone or his mind was shattered beyond coherent thought. It wasn’t something Ramsay typically felt inclined to risk otherwise.

It was a different kind of intimate to take a man by mouth, simultaneously subservient and dominant. It felt appropriate. Theon had spent the winter months toggling between various roles, but in this moment he was neither pet nor prisoner - and he had never felt so free.

Ramsay’s cock was heavy on his tongue but every delirious groan and eager shift of his hips sent a bolt of power through Theon’s veins. He was almost embarrassed on Ramsay’s behalf. The man was freely leaking with excitement, the taste of skin and salt mixing together as his cock drooled down the prince’s throat.

It was some ten minutes before Theon felt the other man's breathing go shallow, a tension building in his abdomen along with the telltale tightening of his sack. He quickly pulled away, leaving Ramsay hanging desperately on the edge.

“_You son of a whore!_” The headboard creaked with the strain of a chained god struggling mindlessly against his bonds.

Theon dodged a wild kick and left him to it, leisurely moving off the bed. His feet had just about healed, helped along by the magic of the ritual, and the shackles had not yet returned to his ankles. His soles were thin and sore and every step was a stinging ache, but he could unsteadily walk.

He poured himself a glass from the table pitcher. The water was cool on his abused throat.

“You should see yourself,” he said roughly. “You look absolutely ravaged.”

Ramsay’s cock was shiny with slick and saliva, fully erect and swollen against the planes of his abdomen. The rest of him had begun to glisten with a sheen of sweat, and he was flushed and feverish all over.

“You blush all the way down to your chest,” Theon observed, tracing the line of his clavicle. “That’s endearing. Would you bite me if I kissed you?”

Ramsay seemed too winded for talking but the angry, feral look in his eyes spoke for itself.

“What a shame. Maybe later.” Theon set the glass down and sidled back onto the bed. “Shall we?”

Theon didn’t bother to keep count of how many times he drove Ramsay to the cusp of climax before withdrawing all touch and leaving him to flounder. He was much more preoccupied with how quickly and drastically the man seemed to break down.

Ramsay’s whole body was now drenched in sweat, his thighs shaking so badly they had to be held down. He breathed like he was wounded and his wrists had been rubbed near raw by his thrashing. Most telling of all were his eyes, which had become a violent snowstorm of primal, incoherent thoughts.

Midday had come and gone. It was officially afternoon now.

“You are stubborn, aren’t you?” Theon asked. “I think you’re actually too far gone to beg now.”

An irritated but needy grunt was his response.

“I guess there’s always next time. Speaking of,” Theon gave his balls a squeeze, eliciting a hiss of discomfort. “It's really been quite an eventful season. You’ve given me a lot to think about this winter. I’ve even decided that you’re right about a few things.”

He pet Ramsay’s thigh like he was soothing a wild animal. It was an apt comparison.

“We _are_ bound together, you and me. And I do feel things for you that I wish I didn’t. What’s to be done about that?” Theon asked.

Theon knew he didn’t love Ramsay and he was still very unconvinced that Ramsay was physically capable of loving him. Yet there was a hunger there, a terrible want that Theon was just beginning to realize was mutual. Something proud and possessive had grown inside of him, giving birth to a terrible need to be seen and desired for all the awful parts of himself he was so ashamed of.

“You want me to make oaths to you. I’m not opposed to us coming to a… let’s call it a formal understanding, someday. But the thing is, despite the progress we may have made this winter, I still can’t trust you.”

Ramsay writhed weakly, the only evidence that he was at all mentally present.

“I don’t dislike what we’ve had going for us these past few weeks, for what it’s worth. But you’ve said it yourself: balance goes both ways.” He stroked Ramsay’s face, the skin warm and damp. “I have responsibilities. You know that.”

He climbed out of the bed. Between ‘sessions’ he’d been gradually dressing himself, tugging on a new item of clothing while waiting for Ramsay to wind down. He now pulled on a pair of Ramsay’s gloves, the loose spaces a bit awkward for the three fingers he’d lost.

“I suppose we’ll try again next winter. You’ll punish me for what I’ve done here, of course, but I hope that afterwards we can negotiate something between us.” Theon leaned over the bed, leather-clad hand wrapping firmly around Ramsay’s painfully aroused cock. “You always know where to find me.”

When Ramsay finally came it was with a shameless moan, cock spurting a seemingly endless ribbon of seed across his own chest. He slumped boneless against the damp sheets, actual _tears_ shimmering in the corners of his eyes. He’d been tormented so long that the force of his climax had thoroughly wrung him dry, consciousness quickly fading from his grey eyes.

“Until next autumn, my lord.” Theon left him there in that state, firmly shutting the door behind him.

Theon ignored the stares as he moved unimpeded through the keep. The men looked at him differently nowadays. Theon could see it in their eyes: the certainty that the Driftwood Prince had finally lost his mind, or perhaps had been a twisted, perverted wreck all along.

The shades, featureless though they were, seemed to radiate pity. After all the prince had been a _nice_ boy, so tragically corrupted by a monster.

If only they knew.

He pat one of the hounds as he passed through the kennels. His gait was uneven but calm, relaxed, and for once it was how he felt inside.

The forest seemed brighter than usual, the snow giving way easily beneath his feet. He walked through the trees and the thicket, shrugging off the ghosts as he went. There was a taste of spring in the air, and all the darkness and brutality of winter was shrinking back to the shadows from whence it came.

On the spring equinox the North King would awaken. Maybe Theon would be there, just this once, to greet him. He’d always spent spring with his sister, recovering and thinking it best to let the family have time to themselves. But maybe this spring... well. Maybe.

In the meantime he was bound for his sister’s shipwreck palace of salt and spray. He’d kneel before her seastone throne the way he’d knelt before her at the hearth when they were children. She’d take him into her arms and into the waves and everything would be whole again.

To everything there was a season, and the vernal sea was calling him home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah I can't believe I ended this with edging either. Whatever it takes, folks. Dobby is a free elf!!!  
I do have other Halloween-ish stories slated to go out this month. They'll be in this series and oneshots (albeit somewhat lengthy). Thanks for coming on this ride with me!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a short little epilogue and lead-in for the next installment.

Sometimes one good story was all it really took to raise a god.

When times changed and worship shifted it was often the difference between a cultural staple and a historical footnote. Ramsay wondered if one day Theon would have the sense to be grateful. On his own the Driftwood Prince would have faded into less than nothing in a century’s time: just another minor god of pleasure, best known for being a Queen’s brother and a King’s friend.

Wasn’t he so much more now? Now he was pain and rebirth, sacred suffering and inevitable change. Humans were changeable creatures but not all that unpredictable in their tastes. They’d always been morbidly fascinated by the dark and carnal. It was vindicating to know that the mortals found Theon's agony just as beautiful as Ramsay did.

He had seen the Driftwood Prince long before their first meeting, albeit through stolen glimpses that had only occurred by chance at the time. It was funny how destiny could sneak up on a person like that.

The Prince always liked to visit the North King in summer, when the air was cool and the rain fell soft. Tales of their misadventures and exploits together were long known to amuse and endear the people. The Prince was always the instigator of some manner of trouble, often through a playful act of offense or by bedding the wrong man’s wife. Together he and the North King, sometimes with the King’s bastard brother, would consistently have to contrive a way out of the situation. Silly little summertime stories, all of them.

Ramsay had heard the tales of the Driftwood Prince back when he was still a demigod, lowly and mortal and ever-scrabbling for his father’s favor. Even as a boy he had found nothing charming about an obnoxious, spoiled god of frivolity who indulged himself through the most boring, obvious means possible. When Ramsay finally saw the Prince in person, his brother’s ichor was still fresh on his hands and he'd still found himself itching to slay another god. Only not so quickly this time.

Everything about the Driftwood Prince was just begging to be ruined: that overconfident grin, that soft unmarred skin, those laughing blue-green eyes clear and bright as sea glass. Ramsay had always had an eye for shiny things. He liked to grind them down. There was something deeply satisfying about milling diamonds into dirt.

The god carried the ocean inside him but he also smelled of pine and earth. A pathetic creature caught between worlds, never knowing where he belonged. Ramsay knew - the Prince belonged where all lost and wayward creatures did: in a greater beast’s belly, with his flayed pelt tanning on a rack. There was something beautiful in the brutality of the natural order.

The Prince wasn’t even afraid of the forest. He treated it like a place of play. It must have been truly blissful being that stupid, judging by the grin on his smug face. And yet, it all felt so… _fake_.

All men were fake, really, walking upright and talking civilized when all it took was an empty plate and a deep chill to turn them into hounds, but The Driftwood Prince was especially fake. His obnoxious laughter was fake, his boasting about his homeland was fake, his dismissal of all things but women and drink was fake. The only thing real about the Prince was the look of dejection and misery that colored his eyes when he thought no one could see. Those were the moments Ramsay always watched for, and every time that wretched mask inevitably slipped back into place he felt something within him burn.

It became a bad habit, not that Ramsay didn’t already have a few of those. He just liked to watch. The Prince was a social creature and often went into the forest to teach the mortals. He showed them how to shoot and which prey was best hunted at which time. He made it sound so clean, so simple, so proper and civilized.

“If you hunt indiscriminately like a beast, you’ll upset the balance of the woods,” he would say imperiously, letting a hare go free. “And we are not beasts, are we?”

Ramsay had snorted, pulling a long blade from his boot from just beyond the thrush. The Prince turned his back and the hare didn’t make it thirty paces.

The Prince may have wielded a bow but he was no hunter. The woods were no place for childish games and light smiles. The forest was dark, cruel and cold. It chewed up lesser men and spat them back out for the carrion to find. Air-headed boys should keep to the tourneys if they wanted to show off. The wild had no patience for such things.

_Beware the forest, _the smallfolk would warn their youth. _For all predators and fiends of the night are the Huntsman’s spies._

And the more Ramsay watched, the more he felt the deep churning of his own dark hunger. The Prince embodied everything Ramsay had hated most about the gods back before he was one, and he could feel violence and desire stirring together within him. Soft and spoiled, ignorant and entitled… all Ramsay wanted was to hear him scream.

So how in the hell did they end up here?

“Breathe a word and I will decorate these halls with your entrails.”

Not that it mattered. The bards had a way of knowing when these things happened. Soon they’d be telling all about the Prince’s bawdy trickery at the Huntsman’s expense: a humorous chapter to an otherwise grim tale that the people were sure to flock to at winter’s end. The bitch had gotten him good this time.

Damon looked unsurprised and only slightly troubled by the threats. He averted his eyes with a put-upon sigh before going to undo Ramsay’s restraints.

“... Do you want us to -“

“No.” There wasn’t any point. “He’s gone.”

Theon was gone. _Again._

For a moment Ramsay lay there, unconcerned with his nudity as he rubbed the feeling back into his arms. The rest of his body was still boneless and sated in spite of his bad mood. Anger, arousal and melancholy all churned in his chest, which was a familiar feeling in the aftermath of Theon’s escape. Ramsay had his ways for coping. Hunts and trips to the dungeons, sex with anyone bold or foolish enough to get within arm’s reach… but no one ever bled or cried as well as Theon did.

Ramsay really thought he had him this time. He always did, but surely this was the closest he’d ever been.

The memory of their night together under the golden latewinter moon still warmed him right to his bones: Theon writhing and moaning beneath him on the stone altar, offering all of himself by choice. Even this latest defeat couldn’t really be called a bad memory, with Theon’s mouth so wet and willing around him-

Ramsay cleared his throat. “Get out, will you.”

Damon didn’t need to be told twice when he knew full well how volatile his lord could get in the Prince’s absence. Once Ramsay finished having his little sulk, someone was going to answer for his bad mood. Multiple someones, most likely.

He sank into the bedding that still smelled like Theon. Heavens knew they’d been sharing it almost all winter, the ungrateful slut. And for what? Another failure. Playing nice didn’t work and being forceful never worked, so what the fuck did the bloody minx want?

‘I can’t trust you’, he said. Well boohoo. Ramsay had hunted him, caught him, and won him fairly. By the laws of the wild, owning Theon was his divine fucking _right_. Now spring was here and Theon would be halfway to his sister’s arms by now. There were no forests in that faraway place, which meant no means for Ramsay to mind his movements. Theon would be well and truly beyond grasp until summer, when he finally returned to the mainland.

Until then Ramsay’s imagination would run amok - who was Theon touching, who was he gazing at with those sea green eyes, who was he sharing that perfectly awful smile with? - round and around until he worked himself into a frenzy. It wasn’t like Ramsay wanted to feel this way, rabid and frothing over one used up wretch. He’d been pushed to it. It was Theon’s own bloody fault.

Next year he would keep the Prince in the dungeons. Let Theon rot in a cage until the lock rusted shut, where no one else but the Huntsman would get to even _look_ at him.

Ramsay pulled himself out of bed and started seeking out his clothes. It was time to face another miserable spring, and with it another round of his father’s loathsome comments (_“Lost him again? Don’t you ever learn?”_).

He did, actually. He learned that he liked being wanted just as much as he liked being feared. He learned that Theon could be just as enjoyable intact as he was broken. He also learned that Theon was tired - tired enough to cut a deal. Ramsay didn’t want to admit that he couldn’t keep his quarry by force, but history spoke for itself. The Driftwood Prince was just too slippery, and the prospect of having him bound by oath to actually stay put was too tempting to pass up.

Yes, they were finally getting close now. Ramsay just needed to be patient a little while longer and seal the deal.

He did up his boots, dour mood quickly ebbing away. It was a new morning, a new cycle, and soon to be a new chapter in their story. The Huntsman had best prepare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So some of you are already aware that I've been working on the sequel, and this little epilogue is my announcement that it will soon be up! I've created a new series for the Mythology AU that folks can now subscribe to if so inclined. First chap of the sequel should go live over the weekend, Monday at latest.  
Happy quarantine, all. Hope you're all safe and healthy.


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